Joliet's Map (1670) showing Village site "Ganatsekwyagon"

Louis Joliet (also spelled Jolliet) was born in Quebec in 1645 and was the first important explorer born in North America from European descent. He was taught at the Jesuit seminary in Quebec, but left the order in 1667. He went to France to study cartography and within a year returned to Canada.

This important map of Joliet shows the location of the early Seneca village site and trading center named Ganatsekwyagon (Ganatchekiagon) located just east of the mouth of the Rouge River in the Greater Toronto Area (Pickering).

(To find the location today, by foot you could either cross the Rouge Pedestrian Bridge from the Rouge Beach/ Marsh parking lot in Scarborough and climb the hill to the unmarked high conservation areas, or by car take Rougemount Dr. south from Kingston Road in Pickering toward the Lake.)

During the 17th Century, only two important sites were known to exist in the Greater Toronto Area and were shown on historical maps - Ganatsekwyagon on the Rouge River and Teiaiagon (Teyeyagon) on the Humber. The latter site was destroyed by development.

According to early French Maps before 1670, the primary trade route in the Toronto region used by the French, English and Dutch furtraders was around the eastern edge at the Rouge River where they would arrive in canoes heavily laden with trade goods and left with valuable bales of beaver pelts..

The preference for the Rouge route by the French was nearer to the St. Lawrence route from where they came, it saved going an extra distance of 23 miles for canoe travellers to the Humber route and avoided the possibility of attack from the exposed Scarborough Bluffs and Toronto Island areas.
Before LaSalle's time, the maps indicate that the eatern trail from Ganasekwyagon to the upper Great Lakes was the one generally followed. When bigger vessels started arriving, they required better anchorage and the western route at the Humber River (not yet shown on this early map) would become well used.