After Columbus - Hardcover

In this intimate portrait, encounter the real Indians of North America, peoples whose cherished traditions have endured a mighty upheaval--the peopling of the New World by masses of humanity from the Old.

Historian Herman J. Viola, who has dedicated his career to the study of American Indians and the American West, draws on the Native Americans' tradition of oral history, the archeological record, and the unparalleled resources of the Smithsonian to strip away the myths and stereotypes and to reveal what the American Indians were, and are, really like. By offering many Indian stories that have never before appeared in book form--true stories of the meetings between the red man and the white man--Viola illustrates an exchange far more complex than is generally realized, an exchange that has transformed Indian lives forever as well as having added vital new dimensions to white culture. Indian traditions of individual independence, personal religion, spiritual attachment to the land, valor in battle, and self-reliance have enriched the lives of many non-Indians.

Bursting with 181 full-color and 133 black-and-white photographs of artifacts, digs, Indian portraits, and landscapes, along with special maps and innovative picture stories, and boasting a highly readable text by one of America's leading historians, AFTER COLUMBUS is as fascinating, as intricate, and as intelligent as the multi-faceted culture it reveals.