Among the magnificent gems and jewels left behind by the great Islamic empires, emeralds stand out for their size and prominence. This title presents the story of trade and also of transformations - how members of profoundly different societies at opposite ends of the globe assigned value to a few thousand pounds of imperfectly shiny green rocks.
This vividly written and authoritative book offers an updated account of the activities of the best-known conquistadors and explorers, including Columbus, Cortes, and Pizarro, and reveals the true stories behind the key events in the history of the Americas.
"For anyone who wants to learn about the rise and decline of Potosí as a city . . . Lane’s book is the ideal place to begin."—The New York Review of Books In 1545, a native Andean prospector hit pay dirt on a desolate red mountain in highland Bolivia. There followed the world's greatest silver bonanza, making the Cerro Rico or "Rich Hill" and the Imperial Villa of Potosí instant legends, famous from Istanbul to Beijing. The Cerro Rico alone provided over half of the world's silver for a century, and even in decline, it remained the single richest source on earth. Potosí is the first interpretive history of the fabled mining city’s rise and fall. It tells the story of global economic transformation and the environmental and social impact of rampant colonial exploitation from Potosí’s startling emergence in the sixteenth century to its collapse in the nineteenth. Throughout, Kris Lane’s invigorating narrative offers rare details of this thriving city and its promise of prosperity. A new world of native workers, market women, African slaves, and other ordinary residents who lived alongside the elite merchants, refinery owners, wealthy widows, and crown officials, emerge in lively, riveting stories from the original sources. An engrossing depiction of excess and devastation, Potosí reveals the relentless human tradition in boom times and bust.
This Very Short Introduction examines the Spanish conquistadors who invaded the Americas in the sixteenth century, as well as the Native American Kingdoms they invaded.
Presents the story of how Latin American civilization emerged from the encounter of three great civilizations in the sixteenth century.
Argues that Blue Moves is Elton John's most interesting and illustrative album, the one that opens up and helps to explain his explosive career before the album's release in 1976 and his bumpy yet ultimately stratospheric career after it--