The Fall of Natural Man: The American Indian and the Origins of Comparative EthnologyThis book gives a new interpretation of the reception of the new world by the old. It is the first in-depth study of the pre-Enlightenment methods by which Europeans attempted to describe and classify the American Indian and his society. Between 1512 and 1724 a simple determinist view of human society was replaced by a more sophisticated relativist approach. Anthony Pagden uses new methods of technical analysis, already developed in philosophy and anthropology, to examine four groups of writers who analysed Indian culture: the sixteenth-century theologian, Francisco de Vitoria, and his followers; the 'champion of the Indians' Bartolomé de Las Casas; and the Jesuit historians José de Acosta and Joseph François Lafitau. Dr Pagden explains the sources for their theories and how these conditioned their observations. He also examines for the first time the key terms in each writer's vocabulary - words such as 'barbarian' and 'civil' - and the assumptions that lay beneath them. |
Contents
The problem of recognition | 10 |
The image of the barbarian | 15 |
The theory of natural slavery | 27 |
From natures slaves to natures children | 57 |
The rhetorician and the theologians Juan Gines de Sepulveda and his dialogue Democrates secundus | 109 |
A programme for comparative ethnology 1 Bartolome de Las Casas | 119 |
A programme for comparative ethnology 2 Jose de Acosta | 146 |
Joseph Francois Lafitau comparative ethnology and the language of symbols | 198 |
Notes | 210 |
247 | |
265 | |
Other editions - View all
The Fall of Natural Man: The American Indian and the Origins of Comparative ... Anthony Pagden No preview available - 1982 |
The Fall of Natural Man: The American Indian and the Origins of Comparative ... Anthony Pagden No preview available - 1982 |
The Fall of Natural Man: The American Indian and the Origins of Comparative ... Anthony Pagden No preview available - 1982 |
Common terms and phrases
Acosta America Amerindian ancient animals Apologética historia Apologia Aquinas Aquinas's Arawak argument Aristotelian Aristotle Aristotle's arts attempt barbarians barbarism behaviour belief bulls of donation cannibalism Casas Casas's category of barbarian century Chichimeca Christian cities civil civilised claimed clearly course Covarrubias created creatures cultural customs Democrates secundus described discussion Domingo de Soto encomienda European evidence existence explain fact Francisco de Vitoria Greeks Gregorio groups human Ia IIae q Ibid Inca Indian languages Indies insulanis intellectual Jesuit José de Acosta Juan knowledge Lafitau linguistic live man's Mexica mind missionaries moral natural law natural slave observed origins Oviedo pagans Palacios Rubios political possess possible procuranda races rational reason recognised religion religious Salamanca School of Salamanca sense Sepúlveda slavery social society Solórzano Pereyra Soto Spaniards Spanish symbolic theologians theology theory of natural things thought tribes true understanding Valladolid debate Vitoria words worship wrote