From New Babylon to Eden

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From New Babylon to Eden is written by Bertrand Van Ruymbeke and published by Univ of South Carolina Press. It's available with International Standard Book Number or ISBN identification 164336331X (ISBN 10) and 9781643363318 (ISBN 13).

A revealing account of the choices French immigrants faced as they settled in South Carolina Winner of the National Huguenot Society's 2007 Book of the Year award,From New Babylon to Edentraces the persecution of Huguenots in France and the eventual immigration of a small bloc of the French Calvinist population to proprietary South Carolina. Placing the Carolina migration in the context of the larger Huguenot diaspora, Van Ruymbeke proffers an account that challenges accepted history. Describing their settlement as a process of acculturation and creolization rather than simply assimilation, he contends that most of these French Calvinists sought to create their own churches but were thwarted by an Anglicized elite eager to dominate Anglo-Carolinian society. He also reveals that most members of the initial generation were only moderately prosperous and that it was their descendants who acquired the wealth often associated with lowcountry Huguenots. A new foreword by Owen Stanwood and preface from the author consider the continuing significance of the book nearly twenty years after its original publication.