NAMED A BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020 BY THE SUNDAY TIMES TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT THE TABLET AND THE LADYThis book is a terrific read ... I could not put it down Matthew Restall Literary ReviewThe conquistadores the early explorers and settlers of Spanish America have become the stuff of legends and nightmares. In their own time they were glorified as heroic adventurers spreading Christian culture and helping to build an empire unlike any the world had ever seen. Today they stand condemned for their cruelty and exploitation as men who decimated the ancient civilizations of the Aztecs and the Incas and carried out horrific atrocities in their pursuit of gold and glory.In Conquistadores Mexican historian Fernando Cervantes cuts through the layers of myth and fiction to immerse the reader in the world of the latemedieval imperialist. It is a world as unfamiliar to us as the Indigenous peoples of the New World were to the conquistadores themselves. Drawing upon a wide range of sources including diaries letters chronicles and treatises Cervantes reframes the story of the Spanish conquest of the New World set against the political and intellectual landscape from which its main actors emerged. At the heart of the story are the conquistadores whose epic ambitions and moral contradictions defined an era.From Columbus to Corts Pizarro and beyond the explorers we think we know come alive in this thoughtprovoking and illuminating account of a period that irrevocably altered the course of world history.Enlightening ... Conquistadores makes for fascinating reading Jude Webber Financial Times