Book Discussion - Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest
Details
For our next meeting, we’ll be discussing Matthew Restall’s Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest. Restall challenges the long-standing narrative that a handful of superior Spaniards effortlessly toppled massive New World empires.
Length: 217 pages | ~7 hrs audiobook
Book Description
The story of the Spanish Conquest is often told as a series of miracles led by "exceptional" men like Cortés and Pizarro, but Matthew Restall argues that these stories are largely self-serving fabrications. By weaving together Spanish and Indigenous sources, Restall exposes how the success of the conquistadors actually rested on tens of thousands of Indigenous allies, the devastating impact of disease, and the presence of Black conquistadors who have been erased from the history books. It is a lean, provocative "myth-busting" session that reframes the Conquest not as a sudden European triumph, but as a complex, messy, and prolonged process of political negotiation and survival.