Thursday, May 8, 2008

Québec Now Claims to have Founded Canada

With everything that happened in the news today, I have to admit that the most shocking news for me was to hear Pauline Marois (Parti Québécois), Mario Dumont (ADQ), and several other political and "souverainistes" figures such as Gerald Larose, the historical-distorter, saying in the media that Québec not only founded Franco-Canada, but the country itself by being the first settlements of France in the Nouvelle-France (aka Canada).

This is outrageous? Are all the Quebecers being fed this shit in their history classes?

Yes, I said "shit" because this is bullshit. This year, the city of Quebec will be celebrating their 400 year anniversary. Historically, 4 years after the Acadians. We, the Acadians, were the first people settle in what is now Canada, in 1604. Sure, there were French colonies in the 1500s, but there were no settlements. They were there, mainly in Saguenay, for Fur Trading.

Québec claims they settled first in Nouvelle-France with Samuel de Champlain. Samuel must be turning in his grave. Samuel, with the help of Pierre Dugua sieur de Mons and Jean de Poutrincourt brought artisans (brickers, carpenters, etc) to create the first settlements in the Bay of Fundy in 1603. In 1604, these became the first official settlements in Nouvelle-France... and they were Acadian.

Samuel de Champlain later came back to France. He left, this time head of an exploration party, in 1608 to found Québec (the now city).

Acadie: 1604, the first official Nouvelle-France settlement.
Québec: 1608, after 6 previous settlements in the Bay of Fundy (New-Brunswick, Nova-Scotia).

Yvon Godin said it right: "It's outrageous!"