New English Canaan
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New English Canaan is a three-volume work of history, natural history, satire, and poetry by the lawyer and New England colonist Thomas Morton (l. c. 1579-1647 CE) published in 1637 CE. The book developed out of legal briefs Morton prepared for a lawsuit against the Massachusetts Bay Company and its settlement, the Massachusetts Bay Colony, to revoke their charter in New England and replace the existing government with one presided over by Sir Ferdinando Gorges (l. c. 1565-1647 CE), Morton s employer, who held the patent for the colonization of present-day Maine and part of Massachusetts.
Thomas Morton
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Thomas Morton (l. c. 1579-1647 CE) was an English lawyer, poet, writer, and an early colonist of North America who established the utopian community of Merrymount, sparking conflict with his separatist neighbors at Plymouth Colony and the Puritans of Massachusetts Bay Colony between c. 1626-1645 CE. He is best known for his three-volume work
New English Canaan, published in 1637 CE, which criticized Puritancolonization of North America, praised Native American culture, and satirized some of the best-known figures of Plymouth Colony, notably Captain Myles Standish (l. c. 1584-1656 CE) whom he refers to as “Captain Shrimp” throughout. Morton s work, controversial in its time, is considered the first book banned in what would become the United States of America.