The seven essays that are contained in Mario Gongora's Studies in the Colonial History of Spanish America demonstrate his exceptional range as a historian, as they run from the eve of discovery and conquest of the Indies to the end of the Spanish Empire, and connect matters as seemingly distant as the place of the New World in Spanish utopian thought and the humble workings of the native labour system. Professor Gongora draws on his own previous work on the theory and technique of conquest, showing its European precedents and context, and displaying the mastery of local detail that readers of...