The Simple Cobler of Aggawam in America

The Simple Cobler of Aggawam in America is a 1647 satire by Nathaniel Ward (c.1578-1652), the English-trained lawyer turned Puritan minister of Ipswich (Aggawam) in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Writing as a cobbler patching the torn state of England, Ward lashes religious toleration, women’s fashions, and the chaos of the Civil War in vigorous, eccentric prose. He also drafted the Body of Liberties, the colony’s first legal code. The book is one of the earliest works of American satire. Free PDF download available on BDeBooks.