On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered Europe

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On Savage Shores is a work of historical recovery . . . few books make as compelling a case for such a reimagining”— David Olusoga , GUARDIAN, Book of the Day He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.

In January 2023, On Savage Shores was the Radio 4 Book of the Week and I appeared discussing my research on Radio 4’s Start the Week and Radio 3’s Free Thinking. I also discussed my book on podcasts including Not Just the Tudors, History Hit, and BBC History Extra as well as being interviewed by the Smithsonian Magazine and BBC History Magazine. There are seemingly endless stories, and it is often difficult to remember who is who and how they are related. Remembering what tribe they came from not only can’t be done, it barely matters for the purposes here. The facts of European behavior hold across all nations and individuals – white supremacy and no respect. I love the basic idea: find the voices of indigenous peoples as they traveled to Europe (sometimes voluntarily). Sure, white people described themselves as being seen as gods by indigenous people; almost certainly that's not what indigenous people thought. Deftly weaves diverse and fascinating tales of the exciting adventures, complex diplomatic missions, voyages of discovery, triumphant incursions, and heartbreaking exploitations - of the many thousands of Indigenous travellers to new lands. Essential reading for anyone interested in how the events of the "Age of Exploration" shaped the modern world" — JENNIFER RAFF, author of ORIGINAs well as writing articles for popular publications such as History Today and BBC History Magazine, I have also consulted on a number of fiction and children’s books, as well as blogging for History Matters. I was also invited to be a guest blogger for Scientific American on ' The 2012 Apocalypse, or Why the World Won’t End This Week'. Ugaz’s case is all too familiar in Peru, where powerful groups regularly use the courts to silence journalists by fabricating criminal allegations against them.’

History Today put me ‘ On The Spot’ with their probing questions in July 2017. In January 2018, I responded to media reports of the possible discovery of cocoliztli: the germ responsible for killing 15 million Aztecs. As well as writing for The Conversation, I was interviewed by both Inside Science and Making History on Radio 4. You can also hear me talking about the Aztecs on the BBC Civilisations podcast, shedding light on the history featured in the TV series, and on the acclaimed BBC podcast, You’re Dead to Me, which brings together historians and comedians to learn and laugh about the past The author premises that these enslaved "indios" or people from the New World were diplomatic and advocated for their tribe, Nation, population. Too much of the book is the author explaining why she was using certain words, even going so far as to write a paragraph on the word "stuff" instead of another word.

With romanticism, scant evidence, and verbosity in her heart, the author decides to destroy the subject. The book needs a good editor in which to cut out 2/3 of the content and to get the author to stop TALKING ABOUT HERSELF ALL THE TIME!

A new publication aims to challenge the accepted narrative that modern global history began when the 'Old World' encountered the 'New'; when Christopher Columbus 'discovered' America in 1492. I would have preferred a slightly more academic style of writing. The author made a lot of personal commentary on the subject and often told us how we should feel about something rather than letting us come to our own conclusions. Sometimes it was rather redundant, such as when she described something that was obviously bad and then still felt the need to tell us that this was a bad thing.This whole approach to history follows a powerful modern mantra: we must restore “agency” to people in the past. Looked at in one way, the principle is obviously right: where traditional, one-sided accounts have obscured the active role people really played, we should correct that error. Yet the modern tendency goes much further, privileging any interpretation, however strained, that can turn people from patients into agents. The cause may be a generous moral impulse on the part of the historian; but the consequence, all too often, is more error, just of a different kind. And yet, the Spanish legal system was remarkably fair. With the right prominent lawyer, a western slave could obtain freedom. Queen Isabella set the stage by first of all being disgusted, and then by declaring that all indigenous people from the new lands were free subjects of the Spanish Crown, her vassals, and therefore could not be enslaved. I have just published a major trade book, On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered Europe, telling the stories of the Indigenous Americans who ‘discovered’ Europe in the sixteenth century. The story of these Indigenous Americans abroad is a story of abduction, loss, cultural appropriation, and, as they saw it, of apocalypse - a story that has largely been absent from our collective imagination of the times. There are well-recorded cases of high-status Indigenous people in the Spanish and Portuguese territories, often descendants of prominent nobility, coming over to Europe to appeal for their rights through the Spanish legal system. For example, the sons of [the Aztec emperor] Moctezuma are recorded appealing for money, pensions, jobs and confirmation of the rights to their lands.

This idea of it as an “other slavery” is an allusion to the fact that this hasn’t been widely recognised by history. But it also refers to the fact that it was another kind of slavery. Very often, Indigenous people were involved in forms of forced labour that weren’t technically labelled slavery but were still effectively bondage.For them, Europe comprised savage shores, a land of riches and marvels, yet perplexing for its brutal disparities of wealth and qualityof life, and its baffling beliefs. The story of these Indigenous Americans abroad is a story of abduction, loss, cultural appropriation, and, as they saw it, of apocalypse—a story that has largely been absent from our collective imagination of the times. Funder reveals how O’Shaughnessy Blair self-effacingly supported Orwell intellectually, emotionally, medically and financially ... why didn’t Orwell do the same for his wife in her equally serious time of need?’ There is also a Hollywood-esque story of an English hostage. Partners from Plymouth negotiated a deal to bring the native king to England while one of them remained as a hostage pending the king’s safe return. The English visit went splendidly, but the king died onboard the return trip. After a lot of explaining and negotiation, the natives allowed the hostage to go free anyway. These kinds of stories light up the book.