Description
Book SynopsisThe American Indian—origin, culture, and language—engaged the best minds of Europe from 1492 to 1729. Were the Indians the result of a co-creation? Were they descended from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel? Could they have emigrated from Carthage, Phoenicia, or Troy? All these and many other theories were proposed.
How could scholars account for the multiplicity of languages among the Indians, the differences in levels of culture? And how did the Indian arrive in America—by using as a bridge a now-lost continent or, as was later suggested by some persons in the light of an expanding knowledge of geography, by using the Bering Strait as a migratory route?
Most of the theories regarding the American Indian were first advanced in the sixteenth century. In this distinctive book Lee E. Huddleston looks carefully into those theories and proposals. From many research sources he weaves an historical account that engages the reader from the very first.
The tw
Table of Contents
- Preface
- Introduction: The Discovery of the American Indian
- Chapter I: The Early Origin Literature, Oviedo to Acosta
- Beginnings of the Origin Literature, 1535–1540
- Expansion of the Argument, 1540–1580
- The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel and the Ophirites
- Chapter II: Acosta and García, 1589–1607
- Joseph de Acosta and the Acostan Tradition
- Gregorio García and the Garcían Tradition
- Chapter III: Spanish Scholarship after García, 1607–1729
- Chapter IV: The Debate on the Origins of the Indians in Northern Europe
- Expansion of the Debate to Northern Europe, 1600–1640
- The Grotius–De Laet Controversy
- The Jews in America and The Hope of Israel, 1644–1660
- Toward New Criteria: La Peyrère and the Pre-Adamites
- General Conclusions
- Bibliography
- Index
