Columbus and the Ends of the Earth: Europe's Prophetic Rhetoric as Conquering Ideology

Columbus is the first blazing star in a constellation of European adventurers whose right to claim and conquer each land mass they encountered was absolutely unquestioned by their countrymen. How a system of religious beliefs made the taking of the New World possible and laudable is the focus of Kadir's timely review of the founding doctrines of empire.

The language of prophecy and divine predestination fills the pronouncements of those who ventured across the Atlantic. The effects of such l...