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A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies (Penguin Classics) (Paperback)

by Bartolome Las Casas (Author), Anthony Pagden (Introduction) "Everything that has happened since the marvellous discovery of the Americas - from the short-lived initial attempts of the Spanish to settle there, right down..." (more)

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Product details

Paperback: 192 pages
Publisher: Penguin Classics (25 Mar 2004)
Language English
ISBN-10: 0140445625
ISBN-13: 978-0140445626
Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 12.7 x 1.5 cm

Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 115,078 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)
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#29 in Books > Poetry, Drama & Criticism > History & Criticism > Literary Theory & Movements > Renaissance

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Product Description

Bartolomé de Las Casas was the first and fiercest critic of Spanish colonialism in the New World. An early traveller to the Americas who sailed on one of Columbus’s voyages, Las Casas was so horrified by the wholesale massacre he witnessed that he dedicated his life to protecting the Indian community. He wrote A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies in 1542, a shocking catalogue of mass slaughter, torture and slavery, which showed that the evangelizing vision of Columbus had descended under later conquistadors into genocide. Dedicated to Philip II to alert the Castilian Crown to these atrocities and demand that the Indians be entitled to the basic rights of humankind, this passionate work of documentary vividness outraged Europe and contributed to the idea of the Spanish ‘Black Legend’ that would last for centuries.

About the Author

Bartolome de las Casas was born in Seville around 1484. At the age of eighteen he left for the New World, where he participated in the conquest of Cuba and witnessed the first full-scale massacre of an Indian community. He became a priest and entered the Dominican order. He dedicated himself to the protection and defence of the Indians. Anthony Pagden teaches in the Department of History at John Hopkins University, Baltimore. He is the author of The Fall of Natural Man and Spanish Imperialism and the Political Imagination. Nigel Griffin read modern languages at Oxford and was a Fellow of New College in the 1970s. He now concentrates on writing and translating and has worked for both the UN and the World Bank.

Inside This Book (Learn More)

First Sentence
Everything that has happened since the marvellous discovery of the Americas - from the short-lived initial attempts of the Spanish to settle there, right down to the present day - has been so extraordinary that the whole story remains quite incredible to anyone who has not experienced it at first hand. Read the first page

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	68% buy the item featured on this page: A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies (Penguin Classics) 3.0 out of 5 stars (2) �5.70
	15% buy The Conquest of New Spain (Classics) 4.2 out of 5 stars (5) �8.59
	9% buy The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico 4.8 out of 5 stars (4) �12.49
	4% buy Rivers of Gold: The Rise of the Spanish Empire 1490-1522

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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A remarkable insight into Spain's colonial exploits, 23 May 2001

By A Customer

This is a remarkable insight into the atrocious activities carried out by the Spanish conquistadors and settlers in the New World. What Las Casas witnessed was brutal and sickening. His hard hitting report, which was a letter to Prince Philip (later the king of Spain), is made all the more remarkable by the fact that it condemns the actions and policies of the subjects of the greatest empire on the face of the earth at that time. In a modern context it throws light on to unknown or forgotten acts of genocide and touches on themes that are so readily apparent in today's world.

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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing account of colonial atrocities, 12 Feb 2009

By	Steven Brown - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I've been wanting to read this book for a while, as I've seen it mentioned in various other books I've read about the conquest of the Americas. I am a keen student of this period, and was looking forward to reading one of the most noted accounts of this turbulent time.

Unfortunately, I ended up pretty disappointed. While De Las Casas efforts to inform the Spanish crown of the atrocities are admirable, this book doesn't tell a particularly interesting story.
Firstly, most of the names of the Spaniards are omitted. This is deliberate by the author as an attempt to be a purely historical "recorder". but instead all the reader gets is statements like "this scoundrel did this", or "the governor did that".

This combines to the overall sameness of the book. Each territory has a chapter, but by the end, they all seem to just blend into one another. A favourite device of the author is to say "I cannot go into all the tortures committed here, but I will specify these ones" - he then inevitably describes someone being tortured by burning the soles of their feet, or being torn apart by dogs. While obviously horrific, this is repeated for each territory, without giving any real feel to the differences between the people the Spaniards encountered, if any of the territories were worse, much of the detail that would be more interesting.

In summary, an admirable book for it's time, but there is little to interest the modern reader. For those interested in this kind of title, I would recommend The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico; a description of the conquest of the Aztecs, as told by Aztecs, or this The Conquest of New Spain (Classics) - the conquest of the Aztecs, as told by one of Hernan Cortes' soldiers. Both are superb, and more enlightening than this.

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