JOLLIET, or JOLIET, Louis, discoverer, born in Quebec, 21 September, 1645; died in Canada in May, 1700. He was educated in the Jesuit college of Quebec, and received minor orders in 1662, but in 1667 abandoned his intention of becoming a priest, and went to the west for a time. In 1672, Talon, the intendant, and Frontenac, the governor, of New France, determined to make an effort to discover the Mississippi, which was then supposed to empty into the Sea of California. By the advice of Talon, Frontenac charged Jollier with this enterprise, as being, he said, "a man very experienced in these kinds of discoveries, and who had been already very near this river." All the aid the provincial government could afford consisted of a single assistant and a bark canoe. To obtain further assistance in his project he went to a Jesuit mission, and there met Father James Marquette, who had long been desirous of visiting the country of the Illinois. In concert with Marquette and five other Frenchmen, Jolliet arrived in Mackinaw, 8 December, 1672. The savages at this port supplied them with information that enabled them to draw a map of their proposed route, which was afterward revised by Marquette, and in this form was published in Sheds "Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi Valley" {New York, 1852). With the aid of this map the explorers descended Wisconsin and Illinois rivers and entered the Mississippi, 17 June, 1673. On the 25th they visited the first Illinois village, and they then descended the river until they came to a village of the Arkansas Indians in 330 40' north lati-rude. They set out on their return for the colony on 17 July, having ascertained beyond a doubt that the Mississippi empties into the Gulf of Mexico. Making their way northward against strong currents, they reached the mission of St. Francis Xavier on Lac des Puants (Lake Winnipeg) toward the end of September. Here Jolliet spent the winter, and in the spring of 1674 he returned to Quebec after losing his valuable maps and papers by the upsetting of his canoe in Lachine rapids. He at once made the governor of the colony and Father Dalton, superior-general of the Jesuits of Canada. fully acquainted with the discoveries that he had made, drawing a map from memory, which is now in the Archives de la marine, Paris. After his return to Quebec, Jolliet married Clara Francis Bissot. He tried to urge the French government to cultivate the rich lands of the Mississippi valley and develop its mineral resources, but his plan for colonizing the territory he had discovered was for the time rejected. About 1680 he was granted the island of Anticosti. and built a fort there, but it was destroyed by the English in 1690, and his wife taken prisoner. Jolliet afterward explored Labradot, and was appointed royal hydrographer in 1693. On 30 April, 1697, he was granted the seigniory of Joliet, south of Quebec, which is still in possession of his descendants. The question as to whether the honor of first exploring the Mississippi belongs to Marquette, Jollier, or La Salle (q. v.) has long been a subject of controversy. See "Memoire de Nicolas Perrot," vol. iii. of the "Bibliotheca Americana" (Paris and Leipsic, 1864); Parkman's "La Salle" (1869); Pierre Margry's "Memoires et documents," Which supports the claim of La Salle (6 vols., Paris, 1876-'86); John G. Shea's "Bursting of Pierre Margry's La Salle Bubble" (New York, 1879); and Winsor's "Narrative and Critical History of America" (Boston. 1884-'7), which contains a bibliography of the subject.