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"Translations of the earliest accounts, from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, of the native peoples of the Americas, including Columbus's descriptions of his first voyage. Documents the emergence of a primal anthropology and how Spanish ethnological classifications were integral to colonial discovery, occupation, and conquest"--Provided by publisher

This article identifies a deep historical and systemic relationship between the exercise of political power and a "Cannibal War Machine", which appropriates forms and concepts belonging to the realms of witchcraft and the relation with the divine. It proposes that material and immaterial forms of violence have been the axis of all social exchanges in modernity, deploying death and suffering as a necessary artifact for progress, freedom and capitalist market through a logic that evokes the sacrifices to the gods and the sacred status of the liberal democratic order. From the conquest and colonization of the New World, the profits of plunder and extraction of the wealth of the Amerindian territory made the cannibal white-man (a stock figure in non- Western imagination) to unleash such a war machine that devours peoples and resources to feed the colonial State. In the contemporary world, the use of cutting-edge technologies swathes military actions with an aura of mystery, which mimics the imaginaries of magic and witchcraft, deliberately spreading a mystic that generates fear and social chaos, quite convenient to the military interests. After five centuries of intertwining of political power and violence, it would seem that the machine of war has not satiated itself and that it keeps claiming for more blood in the name of liberty and progress. ; El presente artículo identifica una relación histórica y sistémica entre el ejercicio del poder político y una "máquina de guerra caníbal" que se apropia de formas y conceptos propios del ámbito de la brujería y de la relación con lo divino. Se propone que la violencia material y simbólica ha sido el eje de todos los intercambios sociales de la modernidad, en la que se despliega un aparato de muerte y sufrimiento justificado en el progreso, la libertad y el mercado capitalista, bajo una lógica que evoca el sacrificio a los dioses y que sacraliza el orden liberal democrático. A partir del proceso de colonización del Nuevo Mundo, el lucro de la guerra y la ambición por explotar la exuberante riqueza del territorio amerindio hicieron que el hombre blanco caníbal (una figura común en los imaginarios no-occidentales) desatara esa máquina de guerra que devora personas y recursos para alimentar al Estado colonial. En la contemporaneidad, el uso de altas tecnologías envuelve a las acciones bélicas con un halo de misterio que hace mímesis de los imaginarios de la magia y la hechicería, lo cual supone la propagación deliberada de una mística que genera miedo y caos social y que conviene a los intereses militares. Después de cinco siglos de coalición entre el poder político y la violencia, pareciera que la máquina de guerra caníbal no se ha saciado y reclama cada vez más sangre en nombre de la libertad y el progreso.

El presente artículo identifica una relación histórica y sistémica entre el ejercicio del poder político y una "máquina de guerra caníbal" que se apropia de formas y conceptos propios del ámbito de la brujería y de la relación con lo divino. Se propone que la violencia material y simbólica ha sido el eje de todos los intercambios sociales de la modernidad, en la que se despliega un aparato de muerte y sufrimiento justificado en el progreso, la libertad y el mercado capitalista, bajo una lógica que evoca el sacrificio a los dioses y que sacraliza el orden liberal democrático. A partir del proceso de colonización del Nuevo Mundo, el lucro de la guerra y la ambición por explotar la exuberante riqueza del territorio amerindio hicieron que el hombre blanco caníbal (una figura común en los imaginarios no-occidentales) desatara esa máquina de guerra que devora personas y recursos para alimentar al Estado colonial. En la contemporaneidad, el uso de altas tecnologías envuelve a las acciones bélicas con un halo de misterio que hace mímesis de los imaginarios de la magia y la hechicería, lo cual supone la propagación deliberada de una mística que genera miedo y caos social y que conviene a los intereses militares. Después de cinco siglos de coalición entre el poder político y la violencia, pareciera que la máquina de guerra caníbal no se ha saciado y reclama cada vez más sangre en nombre de la libertad y el progreso. ; This article identifies a deep historical and systemic relationship between the exercise of political power and a "Cannibal War Machine", which appropriates forms and concepts belonging to the realms of witchcraft and the relation with the divine. It proposes that material and immaterial forms of violence have been the axis of all social exchanges in modernity, deploying death and suffering as a necessary artifact for progress, freedom and capitalist market through a logic that evokes the sacrifices to the gods and the sacred status of the liberal democratic order. From the conquest and colonization of the New World, the profits of plunder and extraction of the wealth of the Amerindian territory made the cannibal white-man (a stock figure in non- Western imagination) to unleash such a war machine that devours peoples and resources to feed the colonial State. In the contemporary world, the use of cutting-edge technologies swathes military actions with an aura of mystery, which mimics the imaginaries of magic and witchcraft, deliberately spreading a mystic that generates fear and social chaos, quite convenient to the military interests. After five centuries of intertwining of political power and violence, it would seem that the machine of war has not satiated itself and that it keeps claiming for more blood in the name of liberty and progress.

This article identifies a deep historical and systemic relationship between the exercise of political power and a "Cannibal War Machine", which appropriates forms and concepts belonging to the realms of witchcraft and the relation with the divine. It proposes that material and immaterial forms of violence have been the axis of all social exchanges in modernity, deploying death and suffering as a necessary artifact for progress, freedom and capitalist market through a logic that evokes the sacrifices to the gods and the sacred status of the liberal democratic order. From the conquest and colonization of the New World, the profits of plunder and extraction of the wealth of the Amerindian territory made the cannibal white-man (a stock figure in non- Western imagination) to unleash such a war machine that devours peoples and resources to feed the colonial State. In the contemporary world, the use of cutting-edge technologies swathes military actions with an aura of mystery, which mimics the imaginaries of magic and witchcraft, deliberately spreading a mystic that generates fear and social chaos, quite convenient to the military interests. After five centuries of intertwining of political power and violence, it would seem that the machine of war has not satiated itself and that it keeps claiming for more blood in the name of liberty and progress. ; El presente artículo identifica una relación histórica y sistémica entre el ejercicio del poder político y una "máquina de guerra caníbal" que se apropia de formas y conceptos propios del ámbito de la brujería y de la relación con lo divino. Se propone que la violencia material y simbólica ha sido el eje de todos los intercambios sociales de la modernidad, en la que se despliega un aparato de muerte y sufrimiento justificado en el progreso, la libertad y el mercado capitalista, bajo una lógica que evoca el sacrificio a los dioses y que sacraliza el orden liberal democrático. A partir del proceso de colonización del Nuevo Mundo, el lucro de la guerra y la ambición por explotar la exuberante riqueza del territorio amerindio hicieron que el hombre blanco caníbal (una figura común en los imaginarios no-occidentales) desatara esa máquina de guerra que devora personas y recursos para alimentar al Estado colonial. En la contemporaneidad, el uso de altas tecnologías envuelve a las acciones bélicas con un halo de misterio que hace mímesis de los imaginarios de la magia y la hechicería, lo cual supone la propagación deliberada de una mística que genera miedo y caos social y que conviene a los intereses militares. Después de cinco siglos de coalición entre el poder político y la violencia, pareciera que la máquina de guerra caníbal no se ha saciado y reclama cada vez más sangre en nombre de la libertad y el progreso.

This commentary presents an overview of the place of Lourens Lourenszoon's account of his captivity among the Arocouros (Palikur) Indians in relation to other contemporary sources on the native peoples of Guyana. In particular the claims as to witnessing of both cannibalism as well as the capture of a 'headless-man' provide a rich context in which to situate broader issues of ethnographic epistemology and eye-witness observation. Such marvels and monstrosities are closely associated with early wring on the Americas and in this way the account of Lourens Lourenszoon is an important addition to the debates on interpretation of historical documents across cultural space. This new translation also provides important demographic and geographical information on the situation of the native population of the Cassiporé River and region of Amapá (Brazil) in the early seventeenth century that can inform further archaeological, ethnohistorical and ethnographic investigation.

[First paragraph]Sir Walter Ralegh's Discoverie of Guiana. Joyce Lorimer (ed.). London: Ashgate (published for the Hakluyt Society), 2006. xcvii + 360 pp. (Cloth £55.00)The Guiana Travels of Robert Schomburgk 1835-1844. Volume I: Explorations on Behalf of the Royal Geographical Society, 1835-1839. Volume II: The Boundary Survey 1840-1844. Peter Riviére (ed.). Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate (published for the Hakluyt Society), 2006. xii + 266 pp. (Cloth US $99.95)The historiography and ethnology of northeastern South America has, with the publication of these two excellent volumes, been firmly and illuminatingly advanced. Firmly since the scholarly abilities of both editors in their preparation of the texts and key source materials make these works definitive. And illuminatingly because the primary documentary and published materials relating to both Walter Ralegh and Robert Schomburgk have, in different ways, been difficult to access. In the case of Ralegh (and here I am writing as the editor of a recent edition of his Discoverie) the location of the original source manuscript for the 1596 edition was unknown and thought lost. In the case of Schomburgk the publication of his travel accounts in the form of short articles, mostly in the Royal Geographical Journal, often made it difficult to access or copy these accounts. The result was that our understanding of the full impact of his travels and the corpus of his published work was considerably lessened.