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Subject: [IASCOTT] 1910-Marquette and Joliet
Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2002 18:14:13 EST

Chapter 4 cont.

MARQUETTE AND JOLIET.

The story of the voyage of Marquette and Joliet has been told so many times
that but brief reference to it will be made.  These explorers left the
mission of St. Ignatius at Michimillimackinac May 4, 1673, reached the
village of the Mascoutins June 7th and after portage to the Wisconsin river
proceeded down that steam, reaching the Mississippi and a view of Iowa June
17th.  On June the 25th occurred the incident which intimately connects these
explorers with this state.

On that day they discovered a footpath leading to a village of the Illini
Indians, and following it received a welcome hospitable in intent and
eloquent in expression.  Said the head man of the village, advancing to meet
them, "How beautiful is the sun, O Frenchmen, when thou comest to visit us.
 All our town awaits thee, and thou shalt enter all our cabins in peace."
 After smoking the calumet in ceremonial greeting, Marquette and Joliet were
conducted to the village of the great sachem of the Illini where great honor
was shown them in a feast, addresses, more smoking of the calumet,
invitations to remain, and, in default of their acceptance, a farewell by
some 600 of the tribe, who accompanied them to the river bank and bade them a
safe and pleasant journey.

There have been many who have endeavored to locate this occurrence at the
site of Davenport, and this contention has received the approval of a number
of historians.  Indeed, there is much to lend probability to this theory.
 Upon the fac-simile of the original Marquette map preserved at St. Mary's
college, Montreal, the town of Peouarea, or Pewaria, where this welcome
occurred, was shown about midway of the southwest bend of the river on the
eastern border of Iowa.  This corresponds fairly well with the location of
Davenport.

Much as it would please to add this incident to the rich history of this
location, there seems to be ample proof that Peouarea was farther down the
river.  In fact, this geographical point seems to have been difinitely
settled by Prof. Laenas Gifford Weld, of the State University of Iowa, in an
article in the Iowa Journal of History and Politics, issue of January 1,
1903, wherein he discusses the location of this opening incident in the
history of our commonwealth with scientific thoroughness, differing with the
writers who place Peouarea at Davenport or near Keokuk, and settling upon the
mouth of the Iowa river as the place where the feet of these white men first
pressed Iowa soil.

The latitude of Peouarea, as given on Marquette's map, would fix its location
in Lee county, but Professor Weld shows that the latitudes of all the
important points, such as the mouths of large rivers, marked on this maps are
uniformly wrong, except one, the mouth of the Arkansas river, also, that the
error is uniformly one degree and that this constant error must have resulted
from some defect in the instruments with which the observations were taken.
 The Marquette map was wonderfully well drawn, probably by Joliet, who was an
experienced cartographer, and for some years chief hydrographic officer of
New France.  A comparison with modern maps, shows its marvelous accuracy.

Debbie Clough G-erischer


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