Old Boucherville and Seigneurial Heritage

Old Boucherville traces its origins to the founding of the seigneury by Pierre Boucher in 1667, one of the most influential figures in the colonization of Lower Canada, who lent his name to the municipality after obtaining the concession of these lands bordering the Saint Lawrence River, facing the island archipelago that also bears his name today. This status as one of the oldest seigneuries on the south shore gives the historic village core a remarkable heritage depth, where architectural and urban planning elements still survive, testifying to this early colonial settlement, contemporary with the first decades of organized settlement of New France along the river. The immediate proximity of Old Boucherville to the Îles-de-Boucherville National Park, directly accessible from the historic sector by seasonal river shuttle departing from Quai Yvon-Julien, creates a natural complementarity between urban heritage discovery and exploration of island nature. The two destinations share a common history, as the islands were long exploited for agricultural purposes by families of settlers established on the neighboring mainland. This historical continuity between the founding village and the archipelago it long exploited illustrates how the development of Montérégie territory was structured, from the colony's earliest decades, around the dual resource that the Saint Lawrence River and its fertile riverside lands represented.