Missionaries began arriving in 1615, and by the time Bishop Laval arrived in 1659 QuA©bec City and the surrounding province were in the grip of Catholicism. In the city's earliest days, however, the merchants of the fur trade wielded the most power and frequently came into conflict with the priests, who wanted a share in the profits in order to spread their message amongst the aboriginal peoples. The wrangles were resolved by Louis XIV , who assumed power in France in 1661 and was advised to take more interest in his kingdom's mercantile projects. By 1663, New France had become a royal province, administered by a council appointed directly by the crown and answerable to the king's council in France. Three figures dominated the proceedings: the governor, responsible for defence and external relations; the intendant, administering justice and overseeing the economy; and, inevitably, the bishop.

Before the century was out, the long-brewing European struggles between England and France spilled over into the colony with French attacks on the English in New York and New England in 1689 and a foiled naval attack on the city by Sir William Phipps, governor of Massachusetts, in the following year. It was at this time that the Comte de Frontenac , known as the "fighting governor", replaced Champlain's Fort St-Louis with the sturdier ChA?teau St-Louis, and began work on the now-famous fortifications that ring Vieux-QuA©bec.

In September 1759, during the Seven Years War, the most significant battle in Canada's history took place here, between the British under general James Wolfe and Louis Joseph, Marquis de Montcalm . The city had already been under siege from the opposite shore for three months and Montcalm had carefully protected the city from any approach by water. Finally, Wolfe and his four thousand troops heard of an unguarded track, scaled the cliff of Cap Diamant and crept up on the sleeping French regiment from behind. The twenty-minute battle on the Plains of Abraham left both leaders mortally wounded and the city of QuA©bec in the hands of the English, a state of affairs confirmed by the Treaty of Paris in 1763. Madame de Pompadour commented: "It makes little difference; Canada is useful only to provide me with furs".

In 1775 - the year after the QuA©bec Act of 1774 allowed French-Canadians to retain their Catholic religion, language and culture - the town was attacked again, this time by the Americans, who had already captured MontrA©al. The battle was won by the British and for the next century the city quietly earned its livelihood as the centre of a timber-trade and shipbuilding industry. By the time it was declared the provincial capital of Lower Canada in 1840, though, the accessible supplies of timber had run out. The final blow came with the appearance of steamships that could travel as far as MontrA©al, while sailing ships had found it difficult to proceed beyond QuA©bec City. Ceasing to be a busy seaport, the city declined into a centre of small industry and local government, its way of life still largely determined by the Catholic Church.

With the Quiet Revolution in the 1960s and the rise of QuA©bec nationalism, QuA©bec City became a symbol of the glory of the French heritage - for example, the motto Je me souviens ("I remember") above the doors of its parliament buildings was transferred to the licence plates of QuA©bec cars, to sweep the message across Canada. Though the city played little active part in the changes, it has grown with the upsurge in the francophone economy, developing a suburbia of shopping malls and convention centres as slick as any in the country.