Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz

Who was Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz?

Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz was an ethnographer, historian, and naturalist who is best known for his Histoire de la Louisiane. It was first published in installments from 1751–1753 in the Journal Economique, then completely in three volumes in Paris in 1758. After their victory in the Seven Years' War, the English published it in translation in 1763. The memoir was based on Le Page's years in Louisiana from 1718 to 1734, when he learned the Natchez language and befriended native leaders. It included an account by Moncacht-apé, a Yazoo explorer who had completed travel to the Pacific Coast and back, a century before the Lewis and Clark Expedition. He had learned of oral traditions of a land bridge to Asia, by which the Native Americans had come to North America.