Bartolome De Las Casas Book Report

Bartolomé de Las Casas’s book “A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies,” is an eye opening narrative into the tragic massacre that took place in the sixteenth century. Millions of indigenous people were brutally killed and slaughtered by the Spanish in endless ways due to their beliefs and idols. De Las Casas, a Catholic Priest, shares what he saw while on his voyage to the New World throughout the book. De Las Casas divided the monstrosities he witnessed geographically. He began with Hispaniola and eventually ended with The Kingdom of New Granda, each region beginning and ending the same. The Indigenous people would welcome the Spaniards as one of their own, treating them as family, and giving them all they could possibly offer. Then each region ends with the same fate, a brutal massacre and a list of ways the Spanish viciously tortured the native people. Christian is a word that De Las Casas uses frequently throughout the book in replace of “Spanish” or “Spaniards” making all Christians sound like barbarians. The Spanish deemed themselves as Christians wanting to change the natives beliefs. …show more content…
Overall, I think Bartolomé de Las Casas’s book “A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies,” is a very informative book on the massacre of the indigenous people throughout the sixteenth century. However, the book is very one-sided and doesn’t give very much information about other Spanish voyagers, other than the ones who were doing the slaughtering. The book leaves me with a few questions. Were there no other Spaniards that felt the same way that De Las Casas did? Was De Las Casas the only saint? How much did De Las Casas try and stop the brutality? Was he just sitting on the sidelines? I would recommend this book to others who are wanting to learn more about the destruction of the