1493_ Uncovering the New World Columbus Created - Charles C. Mann [0]
THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF
Copyright © 2011 by Charles C. Mann
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
www.aaknopf.com
Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the Lannan Foundation.
Portions of this book have appeared in different form in The Atlantic, National Geographic, Orion, and Science.
Maps created by Nick Springer and Tracy Pollock, Springer Cartographics LLC; copyright © by 2011 Charles C. Mann
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mann, Charles C.
1493 : uncovering the new world Columbus created / Charles C. Mann. —1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
eISBN: 978-0-307-59672-7
1. History, Modern. 2. Economic history. 3. Commerce—History. 4. Agriculture—History. 5. Ecology—History. 6. Industrial revolution. 7. Slave trade—History. 8. America—Discovery and exploration—Economic aspects. 9. America—Discovery and exploration—Environmental aspects. 10. Columbus, Christopher—Influence. I. Title.
D228.M36 2011
909’.4—dc22 2011003408
Front-of-jacket image: De Español y Negra, Mulato, attributed to José de Alcibar, c. 1760. Denver Art Museum, Collection of Frederick and Jan Mayer.
Photo © James O. Milmoe.
Jacket design by Abby Weintraub
v3.1
To the woman who built my house,
and is my home
—CCM
CONTENTS
Cover
Map
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
List of Maps
Prologue
INTRODUCTION / In the Homogenocene
1. Two Monuments
PART ONE / Atlantic Journeys
2. The Tobacco Coast
3. Evil Air
PART TWO / Pacific Journeys
4. Shiploads of Money (Silk for Silver, Part One)
5. Lovesick Grass, Foreign Tubers, and Jade Rice (Silk for Silver, Part Two)
PART THREE / Europe in the World
6. The Agro-Industrial Complex
7. Black Gold
PART FOUR / Africa in the World
8. Crazy Soup
9. Forest of Fugitives
CODA / Currents of Life
10. In Bulalacao
Appendixes
A. Fighting Words
B. Globalization in Beta
Acknowledgments
Notes
Works Cited
Index
About the Author
Other Books by This Author
Additional Images
MAPS
Map 1 The World, 1493
Map 2 Colonial Hispaniola
Map 3 China Sea, 1571
Map 4 Deforestation and Reforestation in Eastern North America, 1500–1650
Map 5 Tsenacomoco, 1607–1670
Map 6 Malaria in Southeast England
Map 7 American Anopheles
Map 8 Recreating Pangaea, 1600
Map 9 Fujian in the Ming Era
Map 10 Viceroyalty of Peru
Map 11 China in the Qing Era
Map 12 China Floods, 1823
Map 13 Spread of Potato Blight, 1845
Map 14 Rubber World, c. 1890
Map 15 Spread of Sugar Through the Mediterranean and Beyond
Map 16 Estate of Hernán Cortés, 1547
Map 17 Portuguese Expansion into Brazil
Map 18 Maroon Landscapes
PROLOGUE
Like other books, this one began in a garden. Almost twenty years ago I came across a newspaper notice about some local college students who had grown a hundred different varieties of tomato. Visitors were welcome to take a look at their work. Because I like tomatoes, I decided to drop by with my eight-year-old son. When we arrived at the school greenhouse I was amazed—I’d never seen tomatoes in so many different sizes, shapes, and colors.
A student offered us samples on a plastic plate. Among them was an alarmingly lumpy specimen, the color of an old brick, with a broad, green-black tonsure about the stem. Occasionally I have dreams in which I experience a sensation so intensely that I wake up. This tomato was like that—it jolted my mouth awake. Its name, the student said, was Black from Tula. It was an “heirloom” tomato, developed in nineteenth-century Ukraine.
“I thought tomatoes came from Mexico,” I said, surprised. “What are they doing breeding them in Ukraine?”
The student gave me a catalog of heirloom seeds for tomatoes, chili peppers, and beans (common beans, not green beans). After I went home, I flipped through the pages. All