Rivers of Gold: The Rise of the Spanish Empire, from Columbus to Magellan
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one of the greatest historians of the Spanish world, here is a new and fascinating account of the first conquests of Spain in North and South America. Hugh Thomas magisterial narrative of Spain in the New World has all the characteristics of the historical literature: amazing discoveries, ambition, greed, religious fanaticism, court intrigue and struggle for the soul of humanity.
Hugh Thomas shows Spain at the beginning of the sixteenth century as a world power on the brink of greatness. Their monarchs, Fernando and Isabel, had conquered Granada from Islam, thereby completing the restoration of the entire Iberian Peninsula Catholic rule. Flush with success, they agreed on a plan of a Genoese sailor obscure for western India, where so-called legend Gold Sponsor of sailing and spices flowed as if they were rivers. For Spain and the world, the decision to send Christopher Columbus west was epochal, the dividing line between medieval and modern.
Rivers of Gold: The Rise of the Spanish Empire, from Columbus to Magellan
Tagged with: Columbus • Empire • from • Gold • Magellan • Rise • Rivers • Spanish
Filed under: Magellan
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Rivers of Gold is carefully studied and documented, but at times the author does not lose sight of the forest for the trees. Several chapters have been written in a style attractive, especially for the arrival of Christopher Columbus to the New World and to concentrate on sections cultures of Central America. However, (as noted in other studies), seems to the author on accounting for all to live, also had minor roles in the exploration of North and South. It takes time to navigate through all these names, merit, many of which mention any connection with subsequent events or consequences. That, Rivers of Gold is a useful text for serious students of this important historical period.
Rating: 4 / 5
If ever there was doubt about the negative effects of too powerful, and underweening authors’ publishers, this book addresses, and for all. One might think that a book of over 500 pages of text used covering the development of the Spanish empire in the New World from Columbus to Magellan, a period of less than 30 years (1492 to 1521), contain a wealth of information the European context, Spanish and Portuguese precedents, nature and role of the Spanish Mediterranean coast of interests and the reasons and consequences of Habsburg Charles V “compounds.
you might think, but unfortunately in this case, you’re wrong. Mr. Thomas clearly enjoys his equipment. We are treated to detailed information, even overwhelming, information about personalities, personal histories, family background, and virtually all operations at virtually all levels in the Exploration and Use of involved in the “Indies” during the period. The only exception is the conquest of Mexico by Cortes, which Mr. Thomas came to work in another. As the author commented on the conquest of Cortez Memoirs of memory that more than 300 survivors accounts that are read, then it is difficult to believe completely.
On the other hand, it is not easy to see that deep learning of Mr. Thomas, a point or a fact. will not be 500 pages of this kind of detail, without significant relationship tailored to the average reader, but the images and maps seem to indicate a wider audience than specialists or experts. For example, do not even really need the specialist to the full name and family origin of any banker that loaned money to the fund simply does not know of Transportation in Columbus, but made all travel to the Caribbean? And what kind of audience would need or want an investment with benefits for each voter to the election of Charles as Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire was past, but certainly no information on how much of the sum was financed by returns or New World, as other reviewers have said, where was the editor?
For a much better discussion of the Spanish Empire “in the New World that the wider European context, Spanish and Portuguese precedents do not include interest Spanish-Mediterranean and connections of the Habsburgs, the Cambridge Modern History are chapters on Spain and the New World, but sometimes difficult to find even a better choice for the average reader.
Rating: 3 / 5
Problems with the book:
1) Too many details about minor characters, places and practices that lead nowhere, where the editor was on this project?
2) minor errors. For example, on page 283, comparing the text and the map shows where Ponce de Leon first land case in Florida (note: it is not near Palm Beach modern). Also at page 529, the hurricane affected are among the disasters Sevilla is included, it never happened.
3) Most incredibly, incredibly dull plot blur said with almost zero background.
I left frustrated and extremely disappointed. I can not understand the rave reviews, it is a book largely overrated.
Rating: 2 / 5
I Did high hopes for this book. Since long I was looking for a well-written history of the Spanish conquest of New World and was drawn by criticism in The New York Times. Well, this book is not what I wanted. As Thomas Tome straddles his reputation, or have perhaps more accurately, his reputation seems to intimidate a good treatment. The figures are overwhelming, even confusing, and Thomas Arcane writing style makes things worse. There must be something better somewhere.
Rating: 2 / 5
In many ways,”Rivers of Gold”ist a traditional, even conservative, historical account of the Spanish conquests in the Western Hemisphere. It describes in detail the ambition and greed colorful exploits crimes, victims and the selfishness of Europeans seeking to achieve three implicit (if not performed in the same way) Objectives: The great wealth for themselves same to conquer new lands for the monarchy and convert to “pagan population to Christianity. Thomas stated intention is to revitalize year from dirt and wipe the miracle and the size of these shipments, which covers the world has changed and has helped create an empire.
His book, thirty years – the first voyage of Columbus in 1492 during the voyage of Magellan, which ended in 1522 – but Thomas answered a lot of data in each page. His story is best when he talks about particular personalities and conquerors, as Queen Isabella, or concentrated Diego Colon. It also provides a decent summary of the machinations that led to Spain during the reign of the Habsburgs and the environment in which the Emperor Charles V, held the rally of his distant lands, never quite understood the magnitude of his conquests name across the world.
may report revealing biography in the book recalls the missionary Bartolomé de las Casas, whose passion and advocacy for American Indians could also be called in this hemisphere first man Rights Campaign. Of course, Las Casas sympathies while certainly been ahead of his time certainly conscribed by his belief that indigenous peoples are protected, is converted primarily because they were entitled. And significantly, and Las Casas was not the mission for Africans. As Thomas exclaimed: “How strange it should have been at that time nobody seemed to hesitate about using the Old World, slaves, among whom are Africans, although many were skeptical about the morality of enslaving the Indians of the New World! ”
But, alas, is hindered “an overwhelming number of Arcane delights. He obviously feels he is ready to those who deserve it more adventurous in the chronicles and newspapers that are mentioned are the primary sources, hundreds of people even mentioned, without introduction or background, never to be again discussed. One can almost imagine the author’s reluctance to dispose of waste from abroad, he wrote one of his cards, there are whole paragraphs that have the excitement of the end credits of a movie, and I fear that many readers, as in the theater, just get up and leave.
For most of his analysis, Thomas relies on his traditionalism, he did not actually afraid of indignation or condemnation of the excesses of the era by two Europeans or Native Americans. It’s jarring, then, in his concluding chapter, a broad brushed read emotions like “Who can doubt that it is now the Spaniards [] was right, the idea of a religion based on human sacrifice or simple worship of the sun and rain give notice? But only eight pages before reading the institution’s “religious phenomena” from the Inquisition in Seville alone, “from 1481 to 1522 of over a thousand people were burned to death, probably . presented in the perspective of a hypothetical visitor from Mars by Thomas early in the book, it would certainly seem not much difference between the two forms of the rite “human sacrifice” may occur on both sides of the Atlantic. Thomas may be on firmer ground had he remained in the rare cases where it weighs on a poorly calibrated scale of relative morality, which form in Europe is limited to the renaissance of Indian companies and place him even offered to more balanced decisions for the rest of the book.
Rating: 4 / 5