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Columbus's Outpost among the Taínos

Name: Columbus's Outpost among the Taínos
Author: Kathleen Deagan, José María Cruxent

Spain and America at La Isabela, 1493-1498

Kathleen Deagan,

José María Cruxent,

304 pages
English
PDF
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eBook - PDF

Columbus's Outpost among the Taínos

Spain and America at La Isabela, 1493-1498

Kathleen Deagan,

José María Cruxent,

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About This Book

In 1493 Christopher Columbus led a fleet of seventeen ships and more than twelve hundred men to found a royal trading colony in America. Columbus had high hopes for his settlement, which he named La Isabela after the queen of Spain, but just five years later it was in ruins. It remains important, however, as the first site of European settlement in America and the first place of sustained interaction between Europeans and the indigenous Tainos.

Kathleen Deagan and Jose Maria Cruxent now tell the story of this historic enterprise. Drawing on their ten-year archaeological investigation of the site of La Isabela, along with research into Columbus-era documents, they contrast Spanish expectations of America with the actual events and living conditions at America's first European town. Deagan and Cruxent argue that La Isabela failed not because Columbus was a poor planner but because his vision of America was grounded in European experience and could not be sustained in the face of the realities of American life. Explaining that the original Spanish economic and social frameworks for colonization had to be altered in America in response to the American landscape and the nonelite Spanish and Taino people who occupied it, they shed light on larger questions of American colonialism and the development of Euro-American cultural identity.

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Information

Publisher

Yale University Press

Year

2008

ISBN

9780300133899

Edition

Topic

History

Subtopic

Latin American & Caribbean History

Index

History

!@

QW

Chapter

2

The

Historical 

Setting

The

ﬁfteenth 

century 

was

a

period 

of

unprecedented 

maritime 

explo-

ration 

and

economic 

expansion 

overseas 

by

Iberian 

powers, 

not

only 

in

the

Americas 

but

also 

in

Africa 

and

Asia. 

Italian 

and

Portuguese 

mer-

chants 

expanded 

their 

markets 

throughout 

the

then 

known 

world;

Spanish 

internal 

expansion 

took 

place 

through 

the

reconquest 

of

Iberia

from 

the

Moors

(the 

reconquista

);

and

Spain 

and

Portugal 

extended 

their

domains 

by

establishing 

colonies 

in

the

Canary 

Islands. 

The

enterprise

of

La

Isabela 

drew 

upon 

all

these 

modes 

of

expansion, 

combining 

ele-

ments 

from 

Columbus’s 

own

mercantile 

seafaring 

experience 

with 

the

reconquest 

and

colonial 

expansion 

of

the

Spanish 

Crown. 

The

resulting

union 

of

elements 

and

assumptions 

was

unwieldy, 

and

although 

it

was

appropriate 

to

European 

experience, 

it

ultimately 

proved 

unsuited 

to

the

circumstances 

of

America. 

European 

expansion 

in

the

ﬁfteenth 

century 

was

fueled 

by

the

fervor

of

the

Iberian 

reconquista, 

the

search 

for

gold 

in

Africa, 

and

efforts 

to

secure 

trade 

with 

Asia. 

It

was

made 

possible 

in

large 

part 

by

develop-

ments 

in

shipbuilding 

technology 

and

navigation 

(ﬁgure 

2

.

1

),

and

Por-

tugal 

led

the

way

in

this 

endeavor, 

capturing 

Ceuta 

on

the

Moroccan

Contents
Preface
Chapter 1. Columbus and La Isabela
Chapter 2. The Historical Setting
Chapter 3. Reluctant Hosts: The Taínos of Hispaniola
Chapter 4. “Hell in Hispaniola”: La Isabela, 1493‒1498
Chapter 5. The Hand of Vandals and the Tooth of Time: La Isabela, 1500‒1987
Chapter 6. The Medieval Enclave: Landscape, Town, and Buildings
Chapter 7. A Spartan Domesticity: Household Life in La Isabela’s Bohíos
Chapter 8. God and Glory
Chapter 9. Commerce and Craft
Chapter 10. Aftermath
Chapter 11. Destinies Converged
Appendix
Note on Historical Sources
Notes
References
Acknowledgments
Index