Beasts or Brothers? 
John Elliott
- The Discovery of Mankind: Atlantic Encounters in the Age of Columbus by David Abulafia Buy this book
- Hans Staden’s True History: An Account of Cannibal Captivity in Brazil edited and translated by Neil Whitehead and Michael Harbsmeier Buy this book
David Abulafia ends his engaging survey of the first encounters between Europeans and the indigenous peoples of the New World with the words of the prophet Malachi: ‘Have we not all one father? Has not one God created us?’ This question, with its corollary, ‘Why do we deal treacherously, every man against his brother, profaning the covenant of our forefathers?’ looms large in his book, just as it did in the minds of more thoughtful 16th-century Europeans as they became aware that the world was more diverse and more crowded than their forefathers could ever have imagined.
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John Elliott is Regius Professor Emeritus of Modern History at Oxford. He has published extensively on early modern Spain, Europe and the Americas, and his books include The Old World and the New, 1492-1650, and, most recently, Empires of the Atlantic World: Britain and Spain in America, 1492-1830.
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