Hugh Thomas gave an update on his progress through his three volume history of the Spanish Empire. He has recently published volume two: the Golden Age, in which he examines the reign of Charles V and the conquest of South America.
Aptly named the Golden Age because he refers to an age of amazing discovery during which the Spanish were afflicted with an insatiable hunger for gold and two thirds of Spain’s income was mined from South America. Thomas had chosen to focus mostly on what the Spanish brought to South America, namely writing, domestic animals, the wheel and Christianity. He asserted that Christianity had been gladly welcomed by the natives, who had until then put up with a religion of human sacrifice. He even went so far as to suggest that the increasing scale of human sacrifice in Mexico was a measure taken to curb the exploding population.
A cultural consequence of this sort of missionary activity was the emergence of the chivalric novel, something I would have liked to hear more about, but not the rest of the audience. Questions revealed they were only interested in the measles and small pox the Spanish bought with them, then one lady stood up, trembling with rage, demanding to know why Thomas hadn’t mentioned the systematic rape of Aztec women by the Spanish, receiving a little round of applause. Even his recital of a few lines of Mexican poetry would not placate them.
As with many lectures I have seen here so far, the audience seem to know what they want to hear, and get cross when the speaker wants to talk about something else. While the ravages of empire building are a whole subject to themselves, that is not what the book is about, and I thought Thomas’ description of Spanish cathedrals built with the stone from Aztec forts encapsulated the spirit of the age appropriately enough.
Comments