In this groundbreaking study on the intersection of race, science, and politics in colonial Latin American, Jose Jouve Martin explores the reasons why the city of Lima, in the decades that preceded the wars of independence in Peru, became dependent on a large number of bloodletters, surgeons, and doctors of African descent. The Black Doctors of Colonial Lima focuses on the lives and fortunes of three of the most distinguished among this group of black physicians: Jose Pastor de Larrinaga, a surgeon of controversial medical ideas who passionately defended the right of scientific learning for...