The Grand Village of the Illinois, or Old Kaskaskia Village, stood along the Illinois River near present-day Utica and became a major agricultural and trading center of the Illinois Confederation, especially the Kaskaskia. Encountered by Louis Joliet and Father Jacques Marquette in 1673, it grew from about 1,000 residents to perhaps as many as 6,000 in the 1680s, making it one of the largest Native American settlements north of Mexico. Its fertile river setting and position between forests and prairies supported farming, hunting, and trade. After disease, fur-trade conflict, and Iroquois attacks, including the village's burning in 1680, its people moved south by around 1691.