The Christie Seigneuries - Estate Management and Settlement in the Upper Richelieu Valley, 1760-1854

By Françoise Noël

In The Christie Seigneuries, Françoise Noël provides a detailed case study of the Christie Seigneuries in the Upper Richelieu Valley (in what is now Quebec) during the period from the French surrender to the British in 1760 to the commutation act of 1854 ending seigneurial tenure. While most seigneurial studies have focused on the censitaires, Noël examines the administrative practices of the seigneurs themselves. She reveals that management practices of seigneuries were influenced more by the personality of the seigneur and his family circumstances, as well as changing economic conditions, than by the judicial rights of the seigneur.

This is a break from conventional English-Canadian historiography, which sees seigneurial tenure as one of the major distinguishing characteristics of Quebec's history. The Christie Seigneuries is one of the few studies in English on the last century of seigneurial tenure in Canada, and one of the few to examine a seigneury run by the laity rather than by ecclesiastics. Putting the seigneuries in a wider context benefits both the history of the seigneury and the history of pre-industrial Canada.

Details:

248 Pages
6 x 9"
Published by McGill-Queen’s University Press, Montreal , 1992
ISBN 9780773508767 (cloth hardcover)