Adapting to a New World: English Society in the Seventeenth-Century Chesapeake (Published for the Omohundro Institute of Early American Hist) [Paperback]

James Horn (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0807846147 | ISBN-13: 978-0807846148 | Publication Date: August 28, 1996

Often compared unfavorably with colonial New England, the early Chesapeake has been portrayed as irreligious, unstable, and violent. In this important new study, James Horn challenges this conventional view and looks across the Atlantic to assess the enduring influence of English attitudes, values, and behavior on the social and cultural evolution of the early Chesapeake. Using detailed local and regional studies to compare everyday life in English provincial society and the emergent societies of the Chesapeake Bay, Horn provides a richly textured picture of the immigrants' Old World backgrounds and their adjustment to life in America.

Until the end of the seventeenth century, most settlers in Virginia and Maryland were born and raised in England, a factor of enormous consequence for social development in the two colonies. By stressing the vital social and cultural connections between England and the Chesapeake during this period, Horn places the development of early America in the context of a vibrant Anglophone transatlantic world and suggests a fundamental reinterpretation of New World society.

Editorial Reviews

Review

James Horn•s excellent history of English society in the seventeenth-century Chesapeake breathes new life into a historiography.

Journal of Southern History

A work of exceptional breadth, extensive research and reading, and skillful analysis.

William and Mary Quarterly

A splendid volume.

Journal of American History

[A]n important book: a synthesis of a generation's study of the 17th-century Chesapeake world fused with his own analytic contributions.

London Review of Books

[A] deeply researched, detailed, and nuanced portrait of the Chesapeake in the seventeenth century.

Virginia Magazine of History and Biography

Product Details

• Paperback: 480 pages
• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press (August 28, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0807846147
• ISBN-13: 978-0807846148
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #776,832 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

James Horn was born in Kent, England, and grew up on the outskirts of London. He taught for 20 years in British universities before moving with his family to the US in 1997. He has worked at the College of William and Mary, Monticello, and is now Vice President of Research and Historical Interpretation at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. He is the author most recently of A Land As God Made It: Jamestown and the Birth of America; Captain John Smith, Writings; and A Kingdom Strange: The Brief and Tragic History of the Lost Colony of Roanoke. He lives in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Adapting to a New World, May 4, 2000

By 

ggcon (Connecticut) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Adapting to a New World: English Society in the Seventeenth-Century Chesapeake (Published for the Omohundro Institute of Early American Hist) (Paperback)

Horn compares local societies in England and the colonial Chesapeake to support his argument that the social development of 17th century Virginia and Maryland cannot be fully understood unless it is placed within the broader context of the social development of the 17th century Anglophone world. Until nearly the end of the 1600s, the majority of colonists in the Chesapeake were born and raised in England. They brought with them not only English traditions and customs, but also news and attitudes that reflected the current social developments in England. The colonial societies were affected by these developments. For instance, the uprisings against proprietary rule in Maryland and Bacon's Rebellion in Virginia appear far less extraordinary when they are viewed together with the political upheavals occurring in England. This broader view of the colonial Chesapeake refutes claims that Virginia and Maryland were somehow abhorrent, rather they were preserving and adapting English traditions and customs to life on the Chesapeake while operating in an extended Anglophone world.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Adapting to a New World, July 25, 2009

By 

J. Lindner (Gem Lake, MN United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Adapting to a New World: English Society in the Seventeenth-Century Chesapeake (Published for the Omohundro Institute of Early American Hist) (Paperback)

This surprisingly readable history of the seventeenth century Chesapeake details how English society was transferred to the new English colonies of Maryland and Virginia. James Horn explores how would be colonists from western and southern England found their way from poverty to new opportunities over seas. However, this is not to say that all former poor English peasants found fame and fortune in the Newe World. America was a rugged, dangerous place and it took special skills to master its challenges.

Few aritocratic gentleman farmers made the hazardous journey across the Atlantic. But younger sons of established families and other minor members of the English gentry quite possibly did make the move. But the vast majority of settlers were indentured servants. SIngle, male-dominated, and determined, these servants took their chances, or were at least more willing to take their chances. Some found work for fair masters while others were taken advantage of. But no where in their minds were they developing distinct "American" senses of priorities.

Too often historians want to sshow how from the very beginning something different was happening in America as hadbeen in place in England. TO a degree that is true because the Chesapeake was very different and very far from the home country. But for 30 years William Berkeley governed Virginia as an appointee of the Stuarts. During the Civil Wars Viginia did not experience the upheaval in its social strata. Maryland wasn't much different. While Lord Baltimore extended an official attitude of religious toleration, this was a political expediency rather than an embracement of religious freedom.

Professor Horn's book is not for everyone, but any scholar who wants to learn more details of Chesapeake's English society will wantto consider reading this book.