Talk:Coureur des bois

Distinction between voyageur and coureur des bois
The Coureur de Bois were French fur traders that ventured out to trade with the aboriginal people in different areas; they worked for many large companies.

The Voyageur and the Coureur de Bois are two very different figures and do not belong on the same page. If they must remain on one page together, the voyageur should have prominence, being the more historically important of the two.


 * Can you help us understand the distinction? Trapper 20:49, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

I completely agree. If you were a Voyageur you may eventually decide to be a Coureur des bois and stay out in the wilderness. As I understand it one did not 'come before the other'. Upshot 22 August 2006
 * I rewrote the original page which was very sketchy and inaccurate. The original title was Coureur des bois but the actual content was about the voyageurs. This confused me since I thought these were actually two different fur trade figures (which they are). I set about trying to clear things up in my own mind, and hopefully, clean up the article. I thought that a new title may be warranted. Rather than retitle, etc. I tried to separate the figures by making the Voyageur section. I did find references that described how the coureur de bois "evolved" from undesirable freelance traders to become the Montreal-based hired-laborer canoemen known as the voyageur. The voyageurs had permits; the coureur de bois were not. The article describes this evolution. Many school textbooks (here in C::anada) also describe the history this way. I don't think the coureur de bois disappeared entirely when the voyageur system started. They most likely overlapped for a while until the efficiency of the voyageur eclipsed the coureur de bois. If there are any expert fur trade historians who could clear this up, please add to this discussion or make changes to the article. My preference would be to separate the coureur de bois and the voyageurs since one is not the other. Obviously, in each article, the other figure would probably need to be alluded to. BrianC 21:55, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
 * I too agree that the subjects should be separated, or else subsumed into another article addressing all aspects of the North American fur trade. Bits and pieces of this are now scattered among several articles. Kablammo 02:57, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
 * If anyone wants to organize a "north american fur trade" home for all these fragments I'd be glad to help... Again, the latest edit by civilengineer has blended the two figures together. We all seem to agree that a Coureur des bois and a voyageur are different characters. Upshot 6 November 2006
 * I think your idea has merit. Retitling/reorganizing to North American fur trade would allow for a much better discussion of the NA fur trade rather than being restricted to the Coueur de bois/voyageurs. A good reference, BTW, is Peter C. Newman's book Empire of the Bay (ISBN 014027488X). On page 289 he mentions that "the voyageurs are sometimes confused with coureurs de bois, a description reserved for the itinerant, illicit fur gatherers who flooded into the Superior Country during the late 1600s and 1700s to outrun the Indian middlemen then dominating the trade." "Voyageur" is not an English term for "coureur de bois". BrianC 02:05, 8 November 2006 (UTC)


 * See also Mountain man -- very US oriented treatment of similar people, activities and lifestyles. Perhaps these two pages could be combined as a network of Fur Trade articles develop.  Just me! (talk) 02:05, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

New page proposal: North American Fur Trade?
Does anyone object to moving this page with its history to a page to be entitled North American Fur Trade? Coureur des bois would redirect to it. The applicable parts of Fur Trade could also be incorporated into it. Kablammo 14:13, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Good idea. That way many other aspects of the fur trade in NA can be explained, not just the coureurs de bois or the voyageurs. I can see discussing the "French" fur trade and the "English" fur trade, company competition, how the fur trade affected settlement etc., etc. BC 16:51, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I think its a good idea to create an article on the history of North American Fur Trade. But I think that redirecting Coureur des bois to North American Fur Trade would be the equivalent of redirecting Sons of Liberty to American Revolution and that is not a very good idea. -- Mathieugp 21:27, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I see your point - coureurs de bois and the NA fur trade are not equivalent by any means. But do they have to have the same weight in order for a redirect, or do we just have to ensure the new article has a thorough description of the coureurs de bois (or other things for that matter such as the voyageurs) in order to justify a redirect. A way around this is to have a short description of the coureurs de Bois, voyageurs, HBC, NWC, etc in the new article and link to the original site by using a "main article" link. There are several other fur trade related articles such as the Hudson's Bay Company, NWC, etc. that could be linked to this way. These other articles would be just as fair game for including in the new North American Fur Trade article and if we rolled one up into the new article, we should roll them all up. But I think rolling up every article that has anything to do with the fur trade would make for a rather complex and long new article. Therefore "main article" links may be the way to go and the new article could be an "anchor article" for the other articles. If we did this I think this coureur de bois/voyageur article would need to be rewritten and separated so that the main article links would not be confusing. Mind you I think the two should be separated anyway since a coureur de bois is not a voyageur.BC 22:57, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * My thought was to start with a general article, with sections on coureur des bois, voyageurs, the competing companies, routes, and history; if the article gets too long then go back to separate articles. But if the separate subjects already justify separate articles then we could just split the present one into two.  Clearly a separate treatment of voyageurs is needed, and it is confusing to have a voyageurs link connect to this article.  I recently created one article and worked on two others on sites along the border route in Ontario/Minnesota and I had to link to this article. Kablammo 23:15, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I think that no matter how we relate the new page to all the other fur trade articles, the idea is a good one and necessary. Things have a habit of eventually falling into place. You could start off by having sections on relevant aspects of the NA fur trade, as you mentioned, with main article links where necessary and see where it goes. My suggestion would be to hold off doing any redirecting until we decide on how to handle existing directly related articles (i.e. start slowly). I'd just go ahead and start the article. BC 00:11, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I think it's a good idea... mostly due to the fact that there is no 'gateway' into the fragments spread all over the place dealing with the tradeupshot 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Maybe 25% of folks have heard of "Voyageur", 1 in 10,000 know of Coureur des bois, and "North American Fur Trade" is a complex phrase that few will search on. My advice is to have at least some type of article under Voyageurs or Voyageur, which could point to those others.

North8000

Voyageurs and Coureurs de Bois
At the time the new licensing system starting in 1681, we see the emergence of the terms voyageurs and engagés for legal participants in the fur trade. From this point on, anyone operating without a contract or congé (and therefore illegally) would be referred to as coureurs de bois (prior to this, all people going into the Pays d'en haut without govenrmental permission were illegal). Voyageurs were wage laborers contracted by licensed merchants. Most often they, through the terms of their contract, would profit from the actual trade of the goods; and many times these voyageurs were themselves traders or invested money into the voyage and trade. Engagés generally did not have vested interest in the canoe or the goods but were simply contracted laborers. It is interesting to note that the term engagé was also used in New France to describe an indentured servant, of whom Governor Frontenac describes as, “a man obliged to go wherever and do whatever his master commanded like a slave during the time of his indentureship” (quoted in Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants p. 27). Engagés most often were contracted to make a trip into the pays d’en haut. and back with goods or supplies, leaving in the spring and returning by the end of the summer. Voyageurs often spent extended periods in the pays d’en haut whereas the engagés were basically seasonal workers. Engagé numbers increase throughout the 18th century and by the period of British controlled trade in the later 18th century, most all workers are engagés but become simply referred to as voyageurs. (Greer, Peasant Lord and Merchant p. 179) It as during this later British controlled period that the distinction between winterers (hivernauts) and pork-eaters (mangeurs du lard) or “Montreal-men” becomes common (Greer p. 182). Also, to note, the licensing that made a coureur de bois illegal during the French regime no longer existed. So there were no coureurs de bois during this later period. Now comes the confusing part. Many of the people that worked illegally one year very well could be legal and licensed the next. Like-wise, amnesty was granted many times to the coureurs de bois when they were needed by the government for their various skills as well as for their numbers. This can be seen as these pardons correlate with major military expeditions (the Fox Wars, The War of Spanish Succession, War of Austrian Succession, and etc.). Often not only was amnesty given to those that surrendered themselves and participated but also trading license were given to them for doing so. In addition to all of this, sometimes the authorities, when complaining about those involved in the fur trade (legal and illegal), referred to everyone involved simply as coureurs de bois. Isac: 64.33.161.42 18:35, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
 * My name is Isaac Walters and this is part of an article that I am writing on Coureur de Bois in New France, I hope that this helps explain the differences between the terms voyageur, coureur de bois, etc. IsaacIWfromWI 19:59, 16 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Will your article be a new WP one replacing this one? You could rewrite this article or change it to incorporate the above information since you seem to have a very good understanding. I would also make sure that references and citations are included. BC 23:55, 16 March 2007 (UTC)


 * One must, as a minimum, take into account the current meaning / definition of the word "Voyageur". Per that meaning / definition, Coureur des bois are Voyageurs. North8000 (talk) 11:54, 11 November 2010 (UTC)    North8000 (talk) 19:42, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

North American Fur Trade
A separate article on North American Fur Trade has now been started. Kablammo (talk) 15:35, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Spelling and italics
CanOD spells it coureur de bois, pl. coureurs de bois, not with a des, and doesn't italicize it. Any reason not to move the article and remove italics? —Michael Z. 2009-01-26 20:12 z 


 * Grammatically, it should be coureur des bois, since les bois means forest, whereas le bois means wood, as in the material.--137.138.4.19 (talk) 09:42, 16 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Back in the 1960s in Ontario, I learned it as courrier des bois. I was totally surprised to see this other spelling. Davidrust (talk) 05:20, 11 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Bois usually refers to wood or woods; "forêt" is the usual translation of forest. Since woods is plural, I agree, "des bois" (of the woods) would be more accurate. I don't think there is any right or wrong whether you use de, des, or even du. I've seen all these expressions used in various publications. Most of my references refer to "de" bois, however. For this term, I wouldn't say that grammar enters into the picture. Spelling in the article, however, should be consistent. BC  talk to me  07:42, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Citation Assistance
I am new to editing on Wikipedia, so I thought I would put this here so I don't mess up the article. If some one could add to the article when they see this it would be appreciated. The citation for the number of strokes per minute comes from a book by Grace Lee Nute, called "The Voyageur" (New York: D.Appleton, 1931), p 55. The original quote: "They answered they were fresh yet [at 7:00pm]. They had been almost constantly paddling since 3 o'clock this morning...57,600 strokes with the paddle, and 'fresh yet!' No human beings, except the Candien [sic] French, could stand this. Encamped... at half past nine o'clock, having come today seventy-nine miles." This would mean 57,600 strokes/16 hours/60 minutes = 60 strokes per minute. I did my graduate work on French Colonial Illinois and the Coureur de(s) Bois under Carl Ekberg, one of the leading experts on French Illinois. Mcardinal (talk) 19:32, 29 April 2009 (UTC)mcardinal
 * Done, thanks.-- B C talk to me  22:48, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Voyageur should be an article
Voyageur should be an article rather than a section within this one. North8000 (talk) 00:52, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Agreed. They should be two separate articles. BC  talk to me  02:51, 27 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, that would be nice. More than I can make happen though. Pfly (talk) 11:23, 27 December 2010

Fleshing out my original comment, "Voyageur" is an extensively used term, and has a different meaning than Coureur des bois. North8000 (talk) 15:45, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

I started the Voyageurs article. Here is my talk page note from that article:
 * I started the article "Voyageurs" (from what was previously a redirect page) by copying the Voyageur section from the Coureur Des Bois article.   Voyageur is an extensively used term, with a different meaning than Coureur Des Bois.  It was discussed there that it should be a separate article.  I used the plural form for the title because the singular is the title of a disambig page. Eventually the Voyageur material should get reduced in or removed from the Coureur Des Bois article, but I'm not going there now.  The same for renaming the new article to "Voyageurs (fur trade)" as had been suggested in the disambig talk page in 2007.      North8000 (talk) 16:43, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * I plan to reduce and modify the Voyageur seciton here to start reflecting the new separation of the articles. North8000 (talk) 11:10, 28 December 2010 (UTC)
 * That reduction is going to take longer than I thought. I will need  to get a better understanding of Coureur des bois in order to properly reduce the voyageur section.  North8000 (talk) 14:11, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Famous Courer des bois not fur traders?
The article says that Courer des bois were fur traders. Then is lists 8 famous Cour des bois, 7 of which have Wikipedia articles. I did a quick read of the 7 articles. All of the articles are about them being explorers, "back country" folks, and diplomats. In 6 articles I found no mention of them being involved in the fur trade, and in the 7th a few word mention of it. I'm not going anywhere with this, other than to say it's a bit confusing. North8000 (talk) 14:17, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

More on the Distinction between Courer des bois and Voyageur
I've been reading up. It looks like Courer des bois can have other general meanings related to woodsman and entepreneur, but that the mainly used meanings relate to the fur trade. During the height of the North American fur trade era when there were Voyageurs, the Voyageurs are a part of the licensed and larger scale organized efforts effort, and the Courer des bois were engaged in the unlicensed individualistic efforts. And "unlicensed" was major in the meaning of the term. Prior to the Voyageur era, where the practice was the Indians brought the furs to the major trading points in settled areas, Courer des bois were the ones who circumvented the system by going deeper into the wilderness and trading there. So in both fur trade eras, the term had a meaning as those working outside of the official system.

Incidentally, the Voyagers were not licensed, their bosses were. Also, the idea that the Courer des bois era sort of ended when the Voyageur era started is not correct. Courer des bois remained a significant (albeit minority) player in the fur trade throughout the Voyageur era. North8000 (talk) 13:00, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

I started new Voyageurs article / OK to remove Voyageurs from this?
So, 2/3 of the current Courer des bois is about Voyaguers rather than Courer des bois. I started the new Voyageurs article by copying the Voyaguers material from here, and subsequently have significantly evolved it, although it has a LONG way to go. This leaves us with a double awkward situation regarding the Voyageurs material in this article. My idea is to delete the Voyageurs material from here. This will temporarily leave this article as a rather awkward stub, but I think that such will push for development of a more thorough Courer des bois article, which I would be happy to help with. Do you have any thoughts on this idea? (support or object) Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 02:16, 15 January 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, I'm going to start doing that. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 00:55, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
 * It is done. I morphed/expanded a "Relation to Voyageurs" section and also kept 2 of the 3 voyageur pictures. North8000 (talk) 15:27, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Is the title wrong?
Should it be Coureur de bois rather than Coureur des bois? Quick check of refs indicated "de". We'd want to make sure the "des" is absolutely wrong, (i.e. that "de" is at least overwhelmingly used, if not the only way) before making a change. North8000 (talk) 12:12, 9 March 2011 (UTC)


 * See my comments above in the "Spelling and Italics" section. I think it boils down to just being consistent. BC  talk to me  17:04, 9 March 2011 (UTC)


 * I just did a Google "scholar" search and the terms "de" and "des" both came up in the titles of articles. So, they're both used. My suggestion would be to keep the present title but in the first/lead paragraph say something like "also often spelled coureur de bois". BC  talk to me  17:22, 9 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks!  And I think we should follow your suggestion.    Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:15, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Voyageur descriptions
This article still has material from when voyagers and courer de bois were confused into one article. I plan to remove or nuance the wording of more of the voyageur descriptions. By "nuance the wording", when courer de bois did long fur trad freight hauls, (which they sometimes did) then their life and travels were similar to that of the voyageurs. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 21:19, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

A few tweaks up for discussion.
When looking through the previous additions to the talk page I can see that this article has come a long way! When reading through, having a wee bit of background knowledge myself, I became a little confused at points.

(1) When reading "Long distance fur trade canoe travel" I found myself desperately wanting a map! It would be helpful to have a visual showing both routes (one west and the other south) described. Also the title could be more clear, maybe simply "Canoe Routes" or "Canoe Travel". (2) I liked that there was mentioning of marriage à la façon du pay. Not many think about the importance of women in the fur trade, but they were critical in the success of coureur des bois. What do you think about either linking marriage à la façon du pay (which has its own page) or going into a little bit of detail- i.e. "Women played a key role as translates, guides and mediators between First Nations and Europeans..."? (3) On a similar note, I think the article does a decent job in identifying the French way of adapting to foreign customs and how the First Nations were vital in Europeans survival and exploration. It would be really good to add some details though. Maybe something about coat beaver (trading of old beaver coats for European goods because the felting process was not quite perfected). At the outset trade and commerce was respectful and both parties had much to gain. This idea could be driven a wee bit more. (4) One thing that isn't mentioned is what drove the Fur Trade...beaver and felt top hats! For context sake this connection needs to be made. (5) The distinction between voyageurs and their early counter parts, coureur des bois, is apparent, but still somewhat unclear. I agree that to try and prevent associating one with the other a distinction needs to be made, but the wording seems a little off. Perhaps in mentioning some of the organized companies, that voyageurs were employed under (Hudson Bay Company and North West Company) would reinforce the difference between licenced and non-licenced. (6) Personally, I think that images in Wiki articles can make or break them. In this case, I enjoyed the image of Hopkin's watercolour, but the more modern photographs seemed very out of context. In the text there is no mention of coureur des bois passed the beginning of the 18th century while the first picture is of a man from 1889 and the image entitled "A coureur des bois setting out on an expedition" looks quite modern as well. Can the term be used passed initial European contact? It may be helpful to explain the more 'contemporary wood runner' in a text box of its own to make the photos relevant. If not, the images could be replaced by those of a birch bark canoe or beaver pelts- both key in the life of a coureur de bois.

Overall, this article was pretty straight forward, well documented and clearly organized. It most definitely refreshed some of my former knowledge and made me want to research specifics. There were just the few things I mentioned above that if tweaked would make it a very informative and clear article. If some of my suggestions are changed (or not for that matter) it is still a great resource to gain background information on the beginnings of the Fur Trade in North America,

I hope some of this helps! I'm llooking forward to other suggestions and opinions! Jj.Metherell (talk) 02:04, 2 February 2015 (UTC)


 * 1) We have File:Grlakes lawrence map.png...more at Canadian canoe routes
 * 2) We could mention women in the fur trade...would even be better to start an article on a few.
 * 3) Good idea we should aslo mention what was traded for services and how women where the main bridge to native relations.
 * 4) Tops hats is well deserving of a mention as well as a few other products.
 * 5) Agree we could say..."immigration westward (to the area known as Rupert's Land) was carried out by "Voyageurs"; French settlers  working for the North West Company; and by British settlers (English and Scottish) representing the Hudson's Bay Company, coupled with independent entrepreneurial woodsman called "Coureur des bois""
 * -- Moxy (talk) 02:41, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

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Stop using French words
Stop using French words voyageur and coureur des bois in the English Wikipedia. If you did not find proper English translations, make them up or at least adapt French words to English rules in terms of spelling, pronunciation and plural forms.Nemohuman (talk) 22:49, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Capstone-Fur Trade
— Assignment last updated by Cahof (talk) 18:53, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

Class blindness and false historicism
in this line "the voyageur, the legal and respectable counterpart to the coureur des bois" the term "respectable" is intended in what way? the following line "Under the voyageurs, the fur trade began to favor a more organized business model of the times, including monopolistic ownership and hired labor" with its invocation of "monopoly" implies to me that centralized control of the fur trade was a desirable outcome from the point of view of the french aristocracy and governance. the use of "respectable" then obscures the class realities of this impact, namely the reduction of mobility for poor people who displaced Indigenous people on these territories, and the attempt by the french to administer stolen lands and the poor in the same way as they do in europe. Kikila mai Tawhiti (talk) 00:00, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Ambiguity and structural racism in 1 sentence
Can someone explain what the intended meaning of this is: "They did this by adopting the Indigenous people's ritual practices and marrying Indigenous women." It's in the "reputation" section. It reads ambiguously as though "marrying Indigenous women" is part of "the Indigenous people's ritual practice". It's also very problematic in that it is pan-indigenizing, making it structurally racist in the forms of knowledge it reproduces.

Which Indigenous people? There are thousands of cultures across what is called north america today. Can this be made more specific to the nations or even cultural groups it is supposedly referencing. Especially with the determiner "the Indigenous people's" (people here is also singular). This is really misleading and reductive, bordering on open racism.

Finally, the sentence also removes all agency from the Indigenous women who, depending on the nation/culture women held a great deal of authority especially around governance and ceremony (patriarchy, in the way this article reproduces it, was imported with europeans). This 1 sentence erases Indigenous women and contributes to structural and obvious racist patriarchal thinking that allows for more and more MMIWG2S and ought to be addressed in a good, respectful way.

The term "ritual practices" ought to be unpacked as well. Does this mean that the europeans participating adopted Indigenous protocols, ceremony, and ways of being? Or is it more appropriative or performative? Did they reject catholicism and capitalism, maybe the european caste/class system? More information is needed to make this sentence make sense. Kikila mai Tawhiti (talk) 19:55, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

The term "ritual practices" ought to be unpacked as well. Does this mean that the europeans participating adopted Indigenous protocols, ceremony, and ways of being? Or is it more appropriative or performative? Did they reject catholicism and capitalism, maybe the european caste/class system? More information is needed to make this sentence make sense. Kikila mai Tawhiti (talk) 19:55, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * We need to make sure that what is here is accurate, informative and sourcable or sourced. Longer term I've been the most active editor here but I can't speak for the passes which you are talking about because they were added by someone else.  I don't agree with the particular lens that you are using to read other problems into them. Also, sometimes the available info does not have more specifics than you describe; that does not automatically make it bad.  That said,  some of the material in that marriage/ sexual area does seem questionable and and or maybe goes too far into that area for this article.   I'd be in favor of paring down those particular questionable areas.  North8000 (talk) 20:49, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Neutrality supports settler genocide of Indigenous peoples. The way we frame knowledge also supports that genocide. We need to hold places like Wikipedia accountable for how knowledge is portrayed. Thanks for your response, it's appreciated. Kikila mai Tawhiti (talk) 21:34, 1 May 2024 (UTC)