Title The tropics of empire : why Columbus sailed south to the Indies / Nicolás Wey Gómez

Published Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, ©2008

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Description 1 online resource (xxiv, 592 pages) : illustrations (some color), maps (some color) Series Transformations : studies in the history of science and technology Transformations (M.I.T. Press) Contents Introduction : why Columbus sailed south to the Indies -- Machina mundi : the moral authority of place in the early transatlantic encounter -- Columbus and the open geography of the ancients -- The meaning of India in pre-Columbian Europe -- From place to colonialism in the Aristotelian tradition -- En la parte del sol : Iberia's invention of the Afro-Indian tropics, 1434-1494 -- Between Cathay and a hot place : reorienting the Asia-America debate -- The tropics of empire in Columbus's Diario Summary "Everyone knows that in 1492 Christopher Columbus sailed west across the Atlantic, seeking a new route to the East. Few note, however, that Columbus's intention was also to sail south, to the tropics. In The Tropics of Empire, Nicolas Wey Gomez rewrites the geographical history of the discovery of the Americas, casting it as part of Europe's reawakening to the natural and human resources of the South. Wey Gomez shows that Columbus shared in a scientific and technical tradition that linked terrestrial latitude to the nature of places, and that he drew a highly consequential distinction between the higher, cooler latitudes of Mediterranean Europe and the globe's lower, hotter latitudes. The legacy of Columbus's assumptions, Wey Gomez contends, ranges from colonialism and slavery in the early Caribbean to the present divide between the industrialized North and the developing South."--Jacket Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 535-568) and index Notes Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002. http://purl.oclc.org/DLF/benchrepro0212 MiAaHDL Print version digitized 2010 HathiTrust Digital Library committed to preserve pda MiAaHDL Subject Columbus, Christopher -- Knowledge -- Geography Albertus, Magnus, Saint, 1193?-1280 -- Knowledge -- Geography Ailly, Pierre d', 1350-1420? -- Knowledge -- Geography Casas, Bartolomé de las, 1484-1566 -- Knowledge -- Geography SUBJECT Ailly, Pierre d', 1350-1420? fast Albertus, Magnus, Saint, 1193?-1280 fast Casas, Bartolomé de las, 1484-1566 fast Columbus, Christopher fast Subject Geography, Medieval. Discoveries in geography. Navigation -- History. Discoveries in geography Discoveries in geography -- Spanish Geography Geography, Medieval Intellectual life Navigation SUBJECT America -- Discovery and exploration -- Spanish. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85004256 Tropics -- Geography Europe -- Intellectual life -- 15th century Subject America Europe Tropics Genre/Form History Form Electronic book LC no. 2007020947

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