Division and Distribution of the Land

The French state decided to adopt the seigneurial system in order to create conditions which would ensure that the population of New France was predominantly French. It was, according to Marcel Trudel, "a virgin country where it was necessary to introduce clear lines of administration for the first time in order to enable a society to develop."

Hence the geometric pattern of the seigneuries carved out of New France was determined by the course of the great pathway that walks, as the Amerindians nicknamed the river. A notional frontage line was drawn in the same direction as the river bank itself at the point where the seigneury was to be established, and parallel boundary lines at right angles to the frontage were projected inland. The rear boundary of the seigneurie followed as straight a line as possible parallel to the frontage determined by the river. True there were many exceptions to this rule, many of them caused by geographical irregularities. "Nevertheless," writes Marcel Trudel, "the geometic patterns of lands granted under the seigneurial system is one of narrow rectangles with boundaries pointed in the same southwest-northeasterly direction as the river.".