An Account, Much Abbreviated, of the Destruction of the Indies With Related Texts

Fifty years after the arrival of Columbus, at the height of Spain's conquest of the West Indies, Spanish bishop and colonist Bartolom de Las Casas dedicated his Brevsima Relacin de la Destruicin de las Indias to Philip II of Spain. An impassioned plea on behalf of the native peoples of the West Indies, the Brevsima Relacin catalogues in horrific detail atrocities it attributes to the kings colonists in the New World. The result is a withering indictment of the conquerors that has cast a 500-year shadow over the subsequent history of that world and the European colonization of it.