A review by docpacey
1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus by Charles C. Mann

4.0

This is an excellent book, well written, entertaining, highly informative. It should probably replace most current high school history texts in the US. I would normally give unadulterated praise for a work so worthy, except for two glaring things: First, Mann's insistence on calling Native Americans "Indians" throughout the book completely undermines his thesis that native cultures should no longer be defined in western terms, and secondly, the use of BC and all other references to the western christian world in dates and philosophies has surely been superseded by modern notation and thought. CE and BCE are common enough that we really don't have to be constantly reminded of every ancient thing in its relation to christian dates and benchmarks, especially in a book whose purpose is to downplay the importance of european conquest in "civilizing" the western hemisphere.