The False River of Julien Poydras: Poet, Politician, Plantation Owner

In this article, I explore some elements of the varied career of Julien Poydras of False River, Louisiana (1746–1824): poet, plantation owner, politician and defender of Roman law practices relating to the Mississippi. These elements have in common a particular relation to the bank of the river. Drawing on the history of the French term ‘riverain’—literally dweller of the riverbank, but eventually coming to mean something more like ‘resident’—I ask how the view from Poydras’s riverbank illuminates questions of settlement and the violent history of enslavement in colonial Louisiana.