Public opinion -- Europe -- History -- Sources, West Indies -- History -- 16th century -- Sources, West Indies, Christopher Columbus, Indigenous peoples -- West Indies -- First contact with Europeans, Indigenous peoples -- West Indies -- Public opinion -- History -- Sources, Indigenous peoples -- West Indies -- Public opinion 

"October 12, 1992, will mark the five hundredth anniversary of the meeting of the Indian world and the Christopher Columbus party on an island in the Bahamas. In a tribute to this important event, Lyman Tyler describes this earliest contact based on first-hand observations recorded by the participants themselves. The bulk of this work presents texts from the period, carefully selected and arranged to portray the Indians as the Europeans themselves came to see them. The account proceeds chronologically following the spread of European exploration and gives the reader a dynamic view of the inhabitants of the Indian world and the changes they underwent as a result of European contact during the seventeen-year period from 1492 to 1509.

Dr. Tyler's interest in the role of the Spanish sovereigns, particularly Queen Isabela, is manifest in the text and in an appendix dealing with a codicil she left to her will regarding the treatment of the Indians. Other primary figures in this saga include members of Columbus's family, Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, whose writings make him an important witness, the Indian rulers Guacanagarí and the lady Anacaona, and Diego Colón, a captured Indian interpreter who was taken to Spain and later returned on Columbus's second voyage."--Book jacket.