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Originally Posted by fantasyfan
I'm working through the first part of this remarkable book. One thing seems clear: Hemming demonstrates how the tragedy of the Inca civilization seems to result from the most perverse set of events imaginable. It seems like Murphy's Law was in full operation!
~snip~
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Quote:
Originally Posted by desertblues
~snip~
The arrogance of the conquerors makes my toes curl and is hard to understand in these days.
~snip~
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fantasyfan
~snip~
This is one of the things I like about Hemming. He may have positions of his own but he doesn't just give black and white judgements--he shows the more complex grey areas.
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Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl
I find it sad to think about the great loss of artifacts to history as they were broken and melted down into gold and silver for their monetary value and the destruction of various Inca temples for the same purposes. There must have been some superb works of art. This quote had an impact on me.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by desertblues
I was thinking exactly the same thing about the golden objects....what a shame.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fantasyfan
Yes--the fate of the artifacts was dreadful. Most of the few wonderful examples that survived exist only because the Conquistadores didn't find them.
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Originally Posted by issybird
This is a great read, like something out of H. Rider Haggard, with the kicker that it all really happened.
I've been especally fascinated by Atahualpa.
The narrative is thrilling, but he doesn't hesitate to interrupt it when he has to elucidate different points of view and conflicting evidence. It's a heady combination of scholarship and a great read, which I would argue is one of the criteria for literary nonfiction; no doubt we'll have more to say about that as we read.
I know; the epitome of art of a culture used as ransom by a king, and treated as so much scrap metal by another. Sic transit gloria mundi, indeed!
I love the detail which creates such a fully realized world. The women eating Atahualpa's hairs! Clothing made from vampire bat skins!
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So I have finished this. At times it was a bit of a chore to keep going, that is when it read like a textbook for the history of the Spanish conquest of the Incas. On the other hand it was nice to have such a detailed picture painted of events and of the major players involved, and all the interesting tidbits of color.
As others have mentioned it seemed that God was really on the side of the Spaniards the way a confluence of lucky circumstances allowed Pizarro and the Spanish to so quickly overcome the Inca. Of course in addition to the fight for secession that Pizarro was lucky enough to encounter at the time of his arrival there was the fact that much of the Inca empire consisted of other tribes that the Inca had only relatively recently subjugated, and often very brutally. So these people were actually willing to assist the Spaniards against the Inca, figuring to replace the rapacious brutal overlords that they knew with the at the time the unknown Spaniards. Much the same as what allowed Cortez to achieve so much success in Mexico against the Aztec Empire. The indigenous people could not have known how much worse the cure was going to be.
I too was also struck by the fact that there were a number of Spaniards that at least had and expressed moral doubts about what they were doing. It did not actually much restrain their actions, but at least some of them were reflective about it. In the end of course they could justify just about anything in the name of the Church.
When reading over and over about how a relative handful of Spaniards were able to rout much larger (sometimes by a factor of 5 to 10 times) Inca armies all because of the Spaniards being mounted on horses it really led me to a what if reflection. What if the horse had not become extinct in the Americas before mankind first arrived? Might the entire history from the first European arrival played out in an entirely different way?
As far as the loss of such artwork and cultural artifacts just to get the gold and silver, yes, indeed we can look back now shudder.
“Whenever I hear the word culture I remove the safety from my Browning.” From the play
Schlageter by Hanns Johst. And associated with the Nazis since it was first performed in 1933 in honor of Hitler's birthday. Modified to “Whenever I hear the word culture I reach for my checkbook” spoken by a character in the Jean-Luc Godard film
Contempt.