Étienne Brûlé, his new story
- Art Duval
- Jun 15
- 8 min read
The truth: So we all know the story of Étienne Brûlé right? Young enterprising explorer comes to North America befriends the Wendat only to be killed and eaten for womanizing and other misdemeanors.
Only the story isn't like we've been told. We were told he was a youth of sixteen sent to Huronia to live among the Wendat. Only he wasn't so young, and volunteered. Some of the errors revolve around assumptions...Champlain mentions "his boy" and it was assumed to mean Brûlé, however it turns out the archives in Paris show that Brûlé did not come to North America quite as early as was assumed.
Documents dated the same year as Champlain was establishing Quebec in 1608. So the story of the 16 year old exploring alone among the Wendat has taken a turn.
Brule was already a land owner and already married when he left for Canada. No earlier than 1610. This I would assume pushes his age back a bit.
His early life: Born in Champigny, France to a vineyard owner named Spire Brusle and Marguerite Geurin, Étienne Brûlé story is subject to some vagaries which may have boiled stories down to him that were actually done by others. We had assumed it was him as no others seem to be named. Turns out we now have a youth travelling with Champlain (mentions a youth), but do not Know his name. Now we know it was not Brûlé , sadly we do not know this youth.( Could it have been Grenolle mentioned later?)
Étienne Brûlé seems to have been orphaned, but not destitute. He and his brother Roch had vineyards in Champigny, we assumed passed down from their father. Champigny is just east of Paris and known for their vineyards He was selling land and his signature is on the bill of sale dated to 1608.
He was also married! Which brings his age, at least in my mind, in question. Typical of records so old his birth records are lost but he was apparently married to Alison Coiffier in 1606, which would make him 14? This seems to make his age unlikely but not impossible however one thing is sure, a 16 year old Étienne Brûlé was not exploring North America for Champlain as the story goes. More than likely Brûlé was older than 18 when he would begin his explorations.
The North American Period:
In 1610 Champlain actually mentions Étienne Brûlé by name, at this point not quite the tender young age of 16 but maybe even into his twenties. We don't know why a young married man who owned vineyards signed on for North America but perhaps he was in debt, possibly he was in search of riches to regain his family farms or was simply sick of the vineyards and wanted to explore and profit off of the riches offered in North America.
He would not be the last to do so. Beginning in 1610, Étienne Brûlé travelled with the Wendat and Algonquin he would join them after a battle with the Iroquois at presently named Lake Champlain. The next day Étienne Brûlé would suggest to Champlain that he take up residence with the "Hurons". Iroquet, and algonquin chief would let him join his tribe while Outchetaguin, a wendat chief allowed one of his party, a boy named SavignonHere we reveal history that we may be led to forget. He is offered to a Algonquin leader, Iroquet. In exchange a Wendat named Savignon to go to Europe. The two groups, Algonquin and Wendat were so close at this time that one completed the transaction of the other without hesitation. Brûlé and Savignon were to learn the others ways and at least in Étienne Brûlé he pursued that goal with an effervescent zeal unmatched anywhere or any time.
Although of Iroqouis descent and customs, the Wendat were allied very closely with Algonquin. Here we see a prime example of that.
Although young, he was a man when he began his time with the Huron. We need to make the distinction between Wendat and Huron. The French called ALL the native peoples in the area now known as Huronia as Hurons. The Wendat were but one part of that. The Wendat lived mostly in long houses in the Iroqouis fashion while the Algonquin (weskirini), also in the area lived in Wigwams. This relationship was so prevalent that Wendat villages can be discerned from Iroqouis by the presence of wigwams among longhouses.
So history has him going with an Algonquin Chief Iroquet, (weskirini?) and this would make sense. The Wendat always had Algonquin allies close by. The Wendat were more sedentary farmers while the Algonquin were hunters and gatherers. If one wanted to see the land, the algonquin is who you would go with. He also probably joined Wendat trading expeditions. IT is unlikely he would ever need to go on his own and the native groups were often known to travel far and wide in hunting, gathering and trading.
The people who he was with were so mobile and nomadic that they wintered one year on the St Lawrence but felt comfortable enough within the area of the Wendat, that they wintered close to modern day Hawkstone at Cahiague
in Huronia. The Wendat who lived in Huronia had migrated over time to that area from the St Lawrence, some would even say from Montreal Island. Those ties still were deep and strong as the chiefs of each division, Wendat and Algonquin that they often met Champlain together and when one offered to keep Étienne Brûlé the other offered a youth to return to France.
Étienne Brûlé would join expeditions with his native allies. He would likely not lead them but be added to their number as the people travelled far and wide across the Great Lakes and North America. He probably set eyes on Niagara Falls, and five of the Great Lakes, something no other European had done despite it having been described to Champlain in meetings earlier.
Brûlé was sent to learn the native ways and this he did wholeheartedly. Oddly although this was his assignment he did it so well Champlain and the Jesuits seen it with disdain for his total assimilation of these habits and customs and this was perhaps out of jealousy.
We also get rumours of his being a womanizer and this would have probably offended his fellow Europeans more than the native peoples as sex didn't come with guilt.
Bruce Trigger writes in The Children of Aataentsic Huron considered premarital sexual relations to be perfectly normal and engaged in them soon after puberty…. Girls were as active as men in initiating these liasons [sic]…. Young men were required to recognize the right of a girl to decide which of her lovers she preferred at any one time. Sometimes, a young man and woman developed a longstanding, but informal, sexual relationship…. This did not prevent either partner from having sexual relations with other friends.
In these early years no evidence of any issues with his native hosts comes up.
His later years: By 1618 Brûlé was in Quebec teaching the Wendat language to Jesuits before returning to France in 1626 and his wife Alison. Here he would join (lead?) a merchant fleet for a few years. So this differs from what I thought his life had been, I had always assumed he had been a young man when he was killed and although 36 is not old he was close to 40 when he died.
The Kirke brothers were merchants who were dealing in the North American fur trade and of questionable morals. Privateers, which is a legalized form of piracy they were a scourge on the western trade and those such as Champlain. They seizing on the knowledge that Brûlé had in the North American wilderness found him at sea and captured he and his vessels. They were looking for his knowledge of the new World and the ever ambitious Brûlé, seeing that the Kirke's would be better allies than enemies joined forces with them and assisted them in taking Quebec. He may have been coerced, he may have been forced, either way Champlain felt betrayed and Quebec was lost.
His last year: This upset Champlain and as things between Iroquet and Outchetaguin also seem to have gone south as well, Brûlé walked into a hornets nest when he thought it was a friendly homecoming. This would cost Étienne Brûlé his life.
The world of the Wendat was that of traders. Étienne Brûlé went against Champlain with the Kirkes and for whatever reason now represented them. This was a serious offence in the world of the Wendat. The Wendat protected the trade more than just about anything.
His death: We know he was killed but was he eaten? Unlikely, as it just wasn't something to do. The Wendat did not simply put someone on a spit and roast them up. At most they possibly ate one of his organs but they did not casually resort to cannibalism. At the time it was not unusual to be said that someone replaced was eaten. They did, we know, torture prisoners ritually. Ironically if Étienne Brûlé was tortured it was due to the respect that had for him as only the bravest of warriors were tortured and the Wendat considered it an honor.
Étienne Brûlé was not the man, or boy, who we think he was. He was actually a well to do merchant who had vineyards in a very prosperous area of France (Champigny). He was married and returned to France twice in his lifetime. Far from the poor boy explorer we were led to believe.
Brûlé was an enterprising young man who made his fortune both in North America and France and seems to have risen, maybe not as high as Champlain but perhaps to a position of somewhat equal footing to his mentor. He had supplied a ship with trade goods as his fleet was plying the waters to North America, was taken by the Kirke Brothers.
Had he not been killed would we have a much stronger impression than the boy explorer?
Étienne Brûlé was a salesman, Sagard the jesuit tells of a time when he negotiated passage past a
"We returned to Cap de Victoire, where the interpreter Brûlé had arrived two days earlier, with two or three Huron canoes. He informed me that the Montagnais and the Algonquin were preventing him from continuing his journey and that they wanted him to wait there with them for the trading boats. They tried to resist but were overcome, particularly the interpreter, who ended up giving them a bag of tobacco.”
This indicates a knowledge of the native customs as tobacco is highly sacred to the native people and would influence them more than material goods. Brûlé was also highly paid for his skills. Lalement another Jesuit writes:
I know an interpreter who has 100 pistoles and permission to take many skins with him every year.
So Étienne Brûlé was not an impoverished and was quite well known in Paris. He rubbed shoulders with some of the high caste like Jean-Jacques Dolu who was the Grand Audiencer of France and the first intendant of New-France.
But at the same time, he also brought with him a young Wendat trader by the name of Amantacha to Paris with him.
Sadly his final days in Huronia don't seem to have been the plan Brûlé had set out, OR perhaps it was and a call to adventure and wealth pulled him to the hands of his death.
I don't believe that Brûlé's issues were with women. As mentioned above it just wasn't the issue with the wendat that would have led to his death.
His alliance with Iroquet, and the Kirkes made him opposed to Champlain and the Wendat. Being a traitor more then being a womanizer was the more likely reason for his murder. The laws of Wendat were based on reciprocity and reconciliation. If one committed an offense on another it was dealt with either in reconciliation, paying the injured part or his family or they were entitled to revenge the injured party. This worked well for those in Wendat society but an outsider like Étienne Brûlé who had no one in the area to offer revenge meant he was an easy target.
Even in death his final resting place is a missing part of History. We know it was Toanche but where was Toanche? There are a few theories and I will endeavour to write of that later.
Étienne Brûlé is not the boy we know but the man. He travelled to many areas not yet explored by Europeans, but for me, his personality and friendship in a foreign land is what we should remember.
Some references I used
Art Duval Pipesmoke of the Past
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