Cliquez ici pour la version française

The Seigneur

The seigneurs were nobles, merchants or religious congregations, who had been granted a fief by the French crown, with all its associated rights over person and property. The seigneurie, or seigniory, (a large piece of land) was granted by the Governor and the Intendant. The seigneurial system was established in New France in 1627 and abolished in 1854. In this system, the seigneur divided his lands between censitaires (settlers, or inhabitants), who could then clear the land and exploit it, as well as build buildings there. Each portion of land was called a censive. Most of these trapeze-shaped lots were along the St-Lawrence or other river, with one narrow side facing the river or a road.

The censitaire tenant paid an annual rent to the seigneur, and also paid to have his grain milled at the seigneurie’s gristmill. In addition to these payments, he paid for cens, a rather symbolic payment which indicated that the habitant’s land was at the bottom of the feudal hierarchy and could not be sub-licensed.

These payments of cens et rente meant that the habitant was the proprietor of his land, and could therefore donate it as part of his inheritance, rent it, or sell it, as long as he paid lods et vente, taxes equivalent to 1/12 of the sale value.

The seigneur did not have many responsibilities towards his habitants. He was obligated to build a mill for his tenants, and they in turn were required to grind their grain there and provide him with one sack of flour out of every 14 produced. The seigneur also had the right to demand a specific number of days of forced labour (called the corvée) of his habitants and could claim rights over fishing, timber and common pastures.

Learn more at the Canadian Encyclopedia.

Source: André Lachance, Vivre, aimer et mourir en Nouvelle-France; Juger et punir en Nouvelle-France: la vie quotidienne aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles (Montréal, Québec: Éditions Libre Expression, 2004), 124-128.