In South America, too, Indians built monumental works and shaped the world to their purposes.

While I find specific relevance in Mann’s discussion of North American subjects, the portions of 1491 dealing with South America are especially important to get a fuller sense of the variety of American Indian cultural achievements. I take this into account when I search for archaeological sites and interpret the results of my investigations. I especially appreciate the major perspectives that Mann conveys in 1491, such as the views that Native American populations were relatively large, involved in dynamic ecological relationships, and shaped the environments in which they lived, expanding clearings, gardens, and rich forest edges, or in some cases, constructing various kinds of earthworks. Now for a word on my perspective: I perform archaeological surveys in places across New York State, in fields and woods and along lakes and rivers, in places such as Coxsackie, Colonie and Queensbury, Syracuse, Ithaca, and Owego. Some of what Mann says may be controversial among some specialists, but typically he has gone to the source, interviewing active researchers, reading the literature, and visiting places key to the discussion. He states “The wait grew more frustrating when my soon entered school and was taught the same things I had been taught.” So Mann wrote a very readable book you can go to as a source on some current (as opposed to many outdated) ideas about such major topics as the size of American Indian populations before contact, the origins of Indian populations, and Indian ecology. If you haven’t read 1491, why should you read it? One big reason is related by Charles Mann himself: in the 1990s, Mann grew tired of waiting for a book to be published on the exciting new discoveries and perspectives concerning Native American history, which he had covered in publications such as Science.

As I write this brief review, trucks are delivering and bookstore employees are unpacking 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created, Mann’s history of what happened since (and largely because of) the enormous cultural exchange between the New World and the Old World. 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus by Charles Mann came out in 2005, long before I started wring in Fieldnotes.

1491 and 1493 by charles c mann