Ambivalent Conquests: Maya and Spaniard in Yucatan, 1517-1570 / Edition 2

by Inga Clendinnen

Overview

In what is both a specific study of conversion in a corner of the Spanish Empire and a work with implications for the understanding of European domination and native resistance throughout the colonial world, Inga Clendinnen explores the intensifying conflict between competing and increasingly divergent Spanish visions of Yucatan and its destructive outcomes. In Ambivalent Conquests Clendinnen penetrates the thinking and feeling of the Mayan Indians in a detailed reconstruction of their assessment of the intruders. This new edition contains a preface by the author where she reflects upon the book's contribution in the past fifteen years. Inga Clendinnen is Emeritus scholar, LaTrobe University, Australia. Her books include the acclaimed Reading the Holocaust (Cambridge, 1999), named a Best Book of the Year by the New York Times Book Review, and Aztec: An Interpretation (Cambridge, 1995), and Tiger's Eye: A Memoir (Scribner, 2001).

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521527316
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	04/28/2003
Series:	Cambridge Latin American Studies , #61
Edition description:	Revised
Pages:	264
Product dimensions:	5.39(w) x 8.39(h) x 0.71(d)

Table of Contents

Part I. Spaniards: 1. Explorers; 2. Conquerors; 3. Settlers; 4. Missionaries; 5. Conflict; 6. Crisis; 7. Attrition; 8. Retrospections; Epilogue. The hall of mirrors; Part II. Indians: 9. Finding out; 10. Connections; 11. Continuities; 12. Assent; Epilogue. Confusion of tongues.

Editorial Reviews

"Clendinnen's elegantly written work describes the devastating effects of Spanish conquest and settlement on the politically fragmented Maya of the Yucatan until 1570.... Her account of the 1562 investigation into Maya religious practices and the political conflicts that accompanied it makes fascinating reading." Choice

"This is a splendid book by a gifted historian. With great subtlety and imagination, Inga Clendinnen draws us into the swirls of missteps, ambitions, deceptions, and fantasies that constituted the conquest drama in Yucatan....Clendinnen has written a remarkably powerful and compelling book....This study ranks among the very best scholarship on the region and will dazzle any serious student of native American peoples, Christian missionaries, and colonial situations." American Historical Review

From the Publisher