author
Francesco Giuseppe Bressani
1612–1672
An Italian Jesuit missionary, explorer, and writer, he is remembered for his dramatic years in New France and for the vivid account he left behind. His life joined scholarship, hardship, and firsthand experience on the colonial frontier.
1 Audiobook
Captives among the Indians : first-hand narratives of Indian wars, customs, tortures, and habits of life in colonial times
by Francesco Giuseppe Bressani, Massy Harbison, Mary White Rowlandson, James Smith
About the author
Born in Rome on May 6, 1612, Francesco Giuseppe Bressani entered the Society of Jesus as a teenager and built a strong academic background before volunteering for mission work in New France. He arrived in Canada in the 1640s and worked among Indigenous communities, especially in the Huron mission.
His years in North America were marked by danger as well as religious commitment. During his mission work he was captured by Mohawk raiders and brutally tortured, but he survived, returned to the field, and later went back to Italy after his health declined.
Bressani is also remembered as an author and mapmaker. His writings about New France helped European readers imagine the region and its peoples, and his 1657 map became one of the notable early visual records of the colony.