1493: Exploring the Legacy of Christopher Columbus and the New World He Discovered

Mr. Greg Gaughran: Love love love this book. A masterful account in an erudite style that reminds me of Jared Diamond's ability to engage multiple disciplines to make a cogent point. Speaks of health, vectors, disease, slaver's mindset, topography, plants, swashbuckling stories of Angolan war princesses. and rubber barons. It has wonderfully opened a part of the world to me.

Australia on Mar 01, 2024

ken stov: This book was a mandatory read for a class, but had an intriguing perspective of Columbus. The author looks at it through a more agricultural and holistic way. Food for thought.

United States on Dec 15, 2023

Rufous Harford: One of these books that changes the way you think about the world. The last book to so completely change my view of a subject I thought I understood was The Blind Watchmaker. I was quoting unlikely facts and stories to friend & family for weeks

United Kingdom on Sep 10, 2023

Gigi: Charming historical excursus into the year and time, just after Columbus began the tragic conquest of the americas

Italy on Jul 04, 2023

Fabricio: Produto excelente!!

Brazil on Jun 11, 2021

Lawrence J. Gemmel: First buy and read 1491. Then you will need to buy and read this book. (And now for the rest of the story...)
These books are thick, with lot's of fascinating detail, but Mann tackles the amazing (and perhaps shocking) story of the impact of European contact with North and South American native peoples with a journalist's ability to explain the science in terms everyone can understand without dumbing down the content. Extraordinary breadth and scope of research, a balanced perspective, and a very compelling and sympathetic description of the tragic consequences, particularly through the rapid spread of European diseases, for indigenous societies.

Canada on Mar 31, 2020

Anne Mills: This is a terrifically interesting and entertaining book, which presented me with at least two blockbuster ideas that changed the way I think about the past. I'll get to those in a minute, but first a few general points. Charles Mann is a science journalist:who seems to specialize in BIG topics. His 2005 book ("1491", which argues that the pre-Columbian population of the Americas was much larger and more sophisticated than generally assumed), was very well received. I enjoyed it so much, and thought it so valuable a book, that I was very anxious to read "1493".

"1493" lived up to my (high) expectations. Mann is remarkable writer, with an extraordinary ability to present very complex facts and ideas in way that's not just accessible to the lay reader, it's fun for the lay reader. This isn't to say that the book isn't carefully researched -- the text is followed by almost 100 pages of footnotes, and throughout he cites and acknowledges the scientists and others from whom he has drawn information. It's just that Mann manages to combine a myriad of facts and hypotheses into a compelling narrative. And he often puts this in very concrete terms, focussing on individual people,...

United States on Dec 06, 2013

doc peterson: As a follow-up to his study of pre-Columbian America in  1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus , Mann now explores the consequences of the European conquest and large-scale settlement of the Americas and its impact on a global scale. This is well trod ground for the specialist, and Mann has little new to add to the disucssion. However, he does connect some dots that have not been closely looked at - particularly the global ecological / econcomic effects of the "Columbian Exchange" and the emergence of a new biological era, the "Homogenocene."

The revolutionary text that first recognized the large scale effects the European conquest of the Americas had on the rest of the world, Alfred Crosby's  The Columbian Exchange  remains as the classic study that Mann seeks to add on to. Essentially, Mann (and Crosby before him) argue that prior to 1492, Europeans were largely confied to Europe, Africans to Africa, Asians to Asia and Americans to the Americas. Likewise the ecosystems of these parts of the world were largely independent of each other (I speak in broad terms; Jared Diamond's brilliant study on the geographical advantages Eurasia has over...

United States on Mar 25, 2012