How the Spanish Empire Was Built: A 400 Year History

by Felipe Fernández-Armesto, Manuel Lucena Giraldo

Overview

“A richly researched account of the clever, industrious and deeply practical men who followed in the footsteps, often literally, of Columbus, Cortés, Pizarro, Núñez de Balboa and others.”—Wall Street Journal

The untold story of the engineering behind the empire, showing how imperial Spain built upon existing infrastructure and hierarchies of the Inca, Aztec, and more, to further its growth.
 
Sixteenth-century Spain was small, poor, disunited, and sparsely populated. Yet the Spaniards and their allies built the largest empire the world had ever seen. How did they achieve this? Felipe Fernández-Armesto and Manuel Lucena Giraldo argue that Spain’s engineers were critical to this venture. The Spanish invested in infrastructure to the advantage of local power brokers, enhancing the abilities of incumbent elites to grow wealthy on trade, and widening the arc of Spanish influence. Bringing to life stories of engineers, prospectors, soldiers, and priests, the authors paint a vivid portrait of Spanish America in the age of conquest. This is a dazzling new history of the Spanish Empire, and a new understanding of empire itself, as a venture marked as much by collaboration as oppression.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781789148404
Publisher:	Reaktion Books, Limited
Publication date:	04/25/2024
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	147,265
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x 1.34(d)

About the Author

Felipe Fernández-Armesto is the William P. Reynolds Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame and an award-winning scholar and historian. His books include Straits.


Manuel Lucena Giraldo is a research scientist at the Spanish National Research Council and an adjunct professor at IE University and ESCP Business School Europe. His books include Firsting in the Early Modern Atlantic World.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Introduction: Making Empire Work
1 Enter the Engineers: Amateurs and Professionals in the Making of Infrastructure
2 The Oceanic Scaffolding: Maritime Communications
3 Making Ways: Landward Communications
4 Troubled Waters: Along and Across Internal Waterways
5 The Rings of Stone: Fortifying the Frontiers
6 On the Waterfront: Ports and Shipyards
7 The Public Sphere: Social and Economic Infrastructrure
8 Health Infrastructure: Hospitals and Sanitation
9 The Missionary Frontier
10 The Last Century: Engineers in the Aftermath of Empire

References
Acknowledgements
Index

Editorial Reviews

"How the Spanish Empire was Built is extraordinarily learned, and gilded with linguistic flourishes."

Literary Review

"'The world’s most successful empires have been engineers’ creations.’ This assertion, made by Fernández-Armesto and Lucena Giraldo in How the Spanish Empire Was Built: A 400-Year History, seems bold at first, almost audacious. Yet within the span of the book’s first two chapters, the authors’ contention seems not only logical and wise but almost irrefutable. . . . A richly researched account of the clever, industrious and deeply practical men who followed in the footsteps, often literally, of Columbus, Cortés, Pizarro, Núñez de Balboa and others. The mission of these takers of territory was completed, the authors argue, by the engineers—makers of ‘the scaffolding . . . on which empire was erected.’"

Wall Street Journal - Tunku Varadarajan

"A formidable achievement."

Spectator

[The authors] explore an under-appreciated yet essential dimension of the Spanish Empire: the public works which allowed . . . a small European minority to control, develop and defend a vast territory.

National Geographic España, on the Spanish edition - Alfonso López

"A plethora of books have been written about the Spanish Empire, but this one offers a refreshing look at the challenges it faced—and largely overcame—in building an effective infrastructure for it. . . .  The wide array of sources employed permits the authors to cover every corner of an empire that was inspired by the example of Ancient Rome, yet remained largely intact for three centuries despite its enormous geographical stretch and a formidable array of rivals. . . . Recommended."

Choice

The authors demonstrate a rare capacity to make accessible a voluminous knowledge of the reality of the overseas territories of the Spanish Monarchy. . . . [This book] should be in the library of every lover of American history.

El Debate, on the Spanish edition - Maria Saavedra

"Be prepared: Fernández-Armesto and Lucena Giraldo will sweep you off the solid ground of what you thought you knew about empire, as they dive beneath the scholarly wave of structuralism to find an infrastructural undertow. But fear not. In the hands of these historical engineers, as witty as they are erudite, this manual for how to make an empire offers an answer to an old question: how on earth did imperialists do it? And their answer is as well designed, built, and fortified as Spain’s colonial enterprise mostly seems to have been."

Matthew Restall

An essential book, magisterially written . . . in a limpid, clear style, without sacrificing academic rigour.

ABC (Spain), on the Spanish edition - Fernando R. Lafuente

’What have the Spaniards ever done for us?’ imperial subjects may have asked, plotting rebellion. ‘Aqueducts?’ One may have ventured. ‘Okay, aqueducts. What else?’ ‘Appeals courts?’ ‘Right! Appeals courts. And?’ ‘Well, the mails?’ ‘Okay. So there are the aqueducts, the appeals courts, the royal mail. But really, what have the Spaniards ever done for us?’ ‘Hospitals?’ ‘The transoceanic fleet system?’ ‘Defensive fortifications?’ ‘Arched bridges?’ ‘A standardized writing system?’ One gets the idea. Certain to spark heated discussions like this one, How the Spanish Empire was Built offers a comprehensive defense of Spanish logistical ingenuity, a neo-Roman project of truly global dimensions. Known mostly to Spanish historians of science and engineering until now, the logistical stuff of empire, what made it function day-by-day for so long despite the tyranny of distance, the temptations of corruption, and the relentless downward tug of entropy, has remained obscure to most Anglophone readers. In an age obsessed with global supply chains, instant communications, and global epidemics, there is much to be learned from predecessors who first encircled the world, for better or worse. The authors say this is simply a book about the ‘scaffolding of empire,’ but it is about much more. It is a provocation.

Kris Lane

"How the Spanish Empire was Built is extraordinarily learned, and gilded with linguistic flourishes."

Literary Review Daniel Rey

02/09/2024

Fernández-Armesto (history, Univ. of Notre Dame; Straits) and Spanish National Research Council research scientist Lucena Giraldo (adjunct, IE Univ. and ESCP Business Sch. Europe; Firsting in the Early Modern Atlantic World) argue that the far-flung colonial empire created by the Spanish was achieved due to the efforts of engineers. In the Americas, distant colonies were stabilized through key elements of infrastructure such as roads, ports, bridges, fortifications, canals, mills, and dams. Without the forethought of engineers, the authors say, the Spanish colonial efforts would likely have faltered. The Spanish were intent on promoting trade and hegemony throughout the lands they colonized, the book argues, and they accomplished this through adept organization that saw Spanish officials send out capable, competent people. The authors tell various stories about the conquistadors, Jesuit missionaries, businessmen, and engineers, which sheds light on how the Spanish sometimes sought to collaborate with them Indigenous populations they colonized while also exploiting them. VERDICT An engaging new approach to understanding the spread of the Spanish empire. Highly recommended.—Brian Renvall

Library Journal