- Tinker, Tink, and Mark Freeland. “Thief, slave trader, murderer: Christopher Columbus and Caribbean population decline.” University of Minnesota Press, vol. 23, no. 1, 2008, p. 25+. Academic OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=AONE&sw=w&u=colu44332&v=2.1&it=r&id=GALE%7CA177943037&asid=6231234790f5548231873f5cdd4cb983. Accessed 29 Sept. 2017.
Note: “The 1496 census counted 1.13 million people inhabiting that half of the island controlled by Colon and his Spanish army with their horses and vicious attack dogs.
By 1500 a Spanish bishop, named Fonseca, estimated that some 500,000 native people were surviving on the island. (26) And as we have already noted, a Spanish census in 1514 reported only 22,000 surviving Indians. The estimates for the earlier period are considerably higher, indicating a significant killing of native peoples at a dramatic and precipitous rate. The Dominicans, who arrived in 1510, estimated the original population to have been around two million, but their estimate seems to have been predicated explicitly on the 1496 census, having presumed it to be the aboriginal number. Thus, we need to turn to that figure.” Shows a shocking decrease of indigenous people that most of whom were killed by Columbus’ men.
Abstract: Has lots of factual information without much opinion throughout. The piece talks about data concerning the possible population before and after the arrival of Columbus, how many died from germs versus swords, and whether Colon was responsible for the genocide of the native people.
- Bigelow, Bill. “Two myths are not better than one.” Monthly Review Foundation, Inc, July-Aug. 1992, p. 28+. Academic OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=AONE&sw=w&u=colu44332&v=2.1&it=r&id=GALE%7CA12478791&asid=177649c59e21ad7cecdd693788e9cc77. Accessed 29 Sept. 2017.
Note: “The traditional “discovery” myth is the one with which we are most familiar: Christopher Columbus–handsome, determined, resourceful, brave, skillful, and reverent–leads a mission of discovery to the uncharted West. While en route to the Indies, he makes a much more important find: America. He claims the land for Spain and Christianity, renames it, brings back a few natives to show off, and plans future trips to the “New World.” An explicit tribute to imperialism, the discovery myth prepares children to accept a world of vast inequities of power and wealth, indeed the myth urges them to root for the beneficiaries of those inequities.” This article sheds some harsh truths on why Columbus should be seen as a villain not a hero historically.
Abstract: Talks about the perceptions of Christopher Columbus historically. Speaks on how we educate our youth about Columbus and why it isn’t practical because of the immoralities and violence.
- Stannard, David E. American Holocaust: The Conquest of the New World. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. https://www.barrington220.org/cms/lib2/IL01001296/Centricity/ModuleInstance/10133/American%20Holocaust%20-%20Columbus.PDF
Note: “in order to exploit most fully the land and its populace, and to satisfy the increasingly dangerous and rebellion organizing ambitions of his well armed Spanish troops, Columbus instituted a program called the repartimiento or “Indian grants”, later referred to, And a revised version, as the system of encomiendas. This was a dividing up, not of the land, but of the entire peoples and communities in the bestowal of them upon a would be Spanish master the master was free to do what he wished with “his people”- have them plant, have them work in the mines, Have them do anything, as Carl Sauer puts it “ without limit or benefit of tenure” Shows what Columbus was willing to do to stay in power and fulfill his need for power over his army and the native people.
Abstract: This PDF file has lots of trustworthy information by a scholar from Oxford on some of the brutalities Columbus showed. The piece moves chronologically making it easier to understand and follow a timeline of events.
- Bartosik-Vélez, Elise. “The Three Rhetorical Strategies of Christopher Columbus.” Colonial Latin American Review, vol. 11, no. 1, June 2002, pp. 33-46. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/10609160220133664.
Note: “Thus there is no evidence that Columbus’s nationalist rhetoric of the recon- quest was related at this time to his later apocalyptic thinking. The 17 April 1492 Articles of Agreement contain no references to the desire nor to the intention either of the sovereigns or of Columbus to evangelize the foreign peoples he might encounter on his voyage. No religious representative was sent to the New World until Columbus’s second voyage in 1493. Therefore, not only is it improbable that the original purpose of the first voyage was religious in nature, but it is even less probable that it was motivated by apocalyptic beliefs belonging to Columbus or anyone else.10 The rhetoric of the re-conquest used by Columbus should be understood as part of a strategic response to a specific nationalist political context—one without any apocalyptic meaning, either overt or intended.” Serves as insight to why the conquests began and how they evolved into quests with completely different objectives than the original goal of the voyages.
Abstract: eBook has useful excerpts of Christopher Columbus actual diary with historical analysis after each quoted part of the diary. Also has three rhetorical strategies of how people view and analyze the diary.