What do you think?
Rate this book
Spanish Empire #3
World Without End: Spain, Philip II, and the First Global Empire
Following Rivers of Gold and The Golden Age, World Without End is the conclusion of a magisterial three-volume history of the Spanish Empire by Hugh Thomas, its foremost worldwide authority. World Without End tells the story of life in a conquered territory that stretched from Cuba to Peru, and of the final conquests of the greatest empire that the world had then seen since the fall of Rome 1,000 years before. By the time of Philip II's death - and after his startling decision, made in his final years, not to invade China - the attentions of the colonists, clergymen, sailors, soldiers and officials of the Spanish Empire were no longer turned to its expansion: their focus, instead, became its management. These were the decades in which modern history began.
496 pages, Hardcover
First published July 3, 2014
44 people are currently reading
810 people want to read
About the author
Hugh Thomas
180 books157 followersLibrarian’s note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
Hugh Swynnerton Thomas, Baron Thomas of Swynnerton, was a British historian and Hispanist.
Thomas was educated at Sherborne School in Dorset before taking a BA in 1953 at Queens' College, Cambridge. He also studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. His 1961 book The Spanish Civil War won the Somerset Maugham Award for 1962. A significantly revised and enlarged third edition was published in 1977. Cuba, or the Pursuit of Freedom (1971) is a book of over 1,500 pages tracing the history of Cuba from Spanish colonial rule until the Cuban Revolution. Thomas spent 10 years researching the contents of this book.
Thomas was married to the former Vanessa Jebb, daughter of the first Acting United Nations Secretary-General Gladwyn Jebb.
From 1966 to 1975 Thomas was Professor of History at the University of Reading. He was Director of the Centre for Policy Studies in London from 1979 to 1991, as an ally of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. He became a life peer as Baron Thomas of Swynnerton, of Notting Hill in Greater London in letters patent dated 16 June 1981. He has written pro-European political works, as well as histories. He is also the author of three novels.
Thomas's The Slave Trade: The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1440-1870 "begins with the first Portuguese slaving expeditions, before Columbus's voyage to the New World, and ends with the last gasp of the slave trade, long since made illegal elsewhere, in Cuba and Brazil, twenty-five years after the American Emancipation Proclamation," according to the summary on the book jacket.
Thomas should not be confused with two other historical writers: W. Hugh Thomas writes about Nazi Germany and Hugh M. Thomas is an American who writes on English history.
Hugh Swynnerton Thomas, Baron Thomas of Swynnerton, was a British historian and Hispanist.
Thomas was educated at Sherborne School in Dorset before taking a BA in 1953 at Queens' College, Cambridge. He also studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. His 1961 book The Spanish Civil War won the Somerset Maugham Award for 1962. A significantly revised and enlarged third edition was published in 1977. Cuba, or the Pursuit of Freedom (1971) is a book of over 1,500 pages tracing the history of Cuba from Spanish colonial rule until the Cuban Revolution. Thomas spent 10 years researching the contents of this book.
Thomas was married to the former Vanessa Jebb, daughter of the first Acting United Nations Secretary-General Gladwyn Jebb.
From 1966 to 1975 Thomas was Professor of History at the University of Reading. He was Director of the Centre for Policy Studies in London from 1979 to 1991, as an ally of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. He became a life peer as Baron Thomas of Swynnerton, of Notting Hill in Greater London in letters patent dated 16 June 1981. He has written pro-European political works, as well as histories. He is also the author of three novels.
Thomas's The Slave Trade: The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1440-1870 "begins with the first Portuguese slaving expeditions, before Columbus's voyage to the New World, and ends with the last gasp of the slave trade, long since made illegal elsewhere, in Cuba and Brazil, twenty-five years after the American Emancipation Proclamation," according to the summary on the book jacket.
Thomas should not be confused with two other historical writers: W. Hugh Thomas writes about Nazi Germany and Hugh M. Thomas is an American who writes on English history.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews
January 29, 2018
A nonfiction book, the third in a trilogy about the Spanish Empire. This one focuses on the time period of King Philip's reign (1527-1598), though it's more concerned with the country's new colonies than anything happening in Philip's court itself. The book is organized by place: we've got New Spain (modern Mexico and the surrounding areas), Peru (the former Incan empire, more or less), newly conquered areas of South America (Chile, Paraguay, Guyana, etc) and the Philippines.
Argh, this book. This fucking book. First of all, it took me over two weeks to read – and it's not that long, about 400 pages – which no book has done to me since... I don't even know when. It's been years at least. It's so unbelievably boring that every page was like trudging through thick mud. And since I spend a significant portion of my time reading articles from academic journals or PhD theses, when I say something is boring, it's not because I'm unfamiliar with the conventions of the genre. Another reviewer compared it to a "locally produced county history", and that is the perfect description. Endless lists of names, characterized only by the town they were born in, who they were relatives of, and the dates they served in various government posts? Got that. Long accounts of debates over tax rates or how to classify property? Yup. Analysis or insightful connection-making? None.
But more important than its mind-numbing lifelessness, World Without End is shockingly racist. I'll share just a few of the quotes I highlighted while reading:
Each subdivision had its particular name: thus the children of blacks and whites were mulattos, a useful designation which nobody seems to employ in our morally opaque twenty-first century.
Of course, the friars knew that vestigial idolatry continued, but such offenses were punished with nothing more serious than the occasional whipping.
(Ah, yes, the 'nothing serious' of being whipped for trying to practice your own religion)
Many slaves seemed at that time to prefer white masters to their indigenous black ones. Most slaves were bought as such, having been enslaved in Africa.
(HOW WOULD YOU EVEN KNOW THAT FIRST CLAIM. What the hell sort of historical record is he using here? This line is, of course, not footnoted.)
(In which Thomas endorses a ridiculous Spanish claim that it was going to conquer all of China using only 12 ships:)
Had it been approved, it would have amounted to the grand climax of a hundred years of Spanish conquests and struggles. Had it happened, it would surely have brought less deprivation to China than occurred under the Manchu dynasty and certainly less than under the terrible communist era of the twentieth century.
But don't worry! Thomas does not restrain his bigotry to non-white races. He's got plenty of condescension for women too. He barely mentions them throughout the book, which – fine. It's a history of conquistadors. He could have made more of an effort, but I understand that he's working from a limited source. But every women that does get mentioned is "beautiful". I AM SO NOT KIDDING:
The new queen, still only fourteen years old, had a dark and Italian complexion, recalling her Medici forbears. She was vivacious and attractive (pg 27)
Philip's mother was the beautiful, strong-minded and unbending Empress Isabel (pg 28)
His famously one-eyed yet beautiful wife, Ana (pg 43)
She was born in 1586 and the Indian maid who looked after her in her cot as a baby saw that she had two beautifully formed roses on her cheeks. (pg 148)
The delightful conquistadora Mencia de Nidos, a woman as beautiful as she was brave (pg 153)
Ursua's beautiful mestiza mistress, Ines de Atienza. She was renowned in the 1550s as 'the most beautiful woman in Peru' (pg 212 - a two for one! )
Unfortunately the prior's mother was a beautiful conversa, Violante Gomes (pg 231)
The tale of the beautiful gallega Isabel de Barreto (pg 327)
Another daughter of Montezuma, the apparently beautiful Techuipo (pg 333)
(By the way, I gathered these by running a search on the text for 'she', and can report that both 'sheep' and metaphorical shes – countries and boats, mostly – far outnumber actual women.)
Thomas also spends multiple chapters eulogizing the work of friars, priests, and missionaries: the buildings they constructed, the books they wrote, the languages they learned, the numbers they converted, etc etc. In their turn, the work of nuns get this one paragraph out of the entire book:
The nuns included brillant cooks. They made pretty dresses for the ever-present images of the Virgin. They chanted charming cradle songs and were, from time to time, allowed to swoon in amorous ecstasy.
I could go on, but I think y'all get the point. But I do want to share one more quote: the final paragraph of the entire book, which I feel really puts a cap on all the crazy shit that came beforehand.
The Spanish empire lasted three centuries, from the early sixteenth to the early nineteenth century. Its last remnants only fell in 1898, following the Spanish-American war in Cuba, over 400 years after Columbus had embarked for the Caribbean. Spain had left behind a Catholic religion and innumerable monuments, a tradition and much literature. Above all, it had created dependencies which matured successfully into the new independent countries of Latin America. Wars in this region are rare. In comparison with the rest of the world, Latin America now seems an oasis of peace.
If I could give World Without End less than one star, I absolutely would. I want to give it negative stars.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
Argh, this book. This fucking book. First of all, it took me over two weeks to read – and it's not that long, about 400 pages – which no book has done to me since... I don't even know when. It's been years at least. It's so unbelievably boring that every page was like trudging through thick mud. And since I spend a significant portion of my time reading articles from academic journals or PhD theses, when I say something is boring, it's not because I'm unfamiliar with the conventions of the genre. Another reviewer compared it to a "locally produced county history", and that is the perfect description. Endless lists of names, characterized only by the town they were born in, who they were relatives of, and the dates they served in various government posts? Got that. Long accounts of debates over tax rates or how to classify property? Yup. Analysis or insightful connection-making? None.
But more important than its mind-numbing lifelessness, World Without End is shockingly racist. I'll share just a few of the quotes I highlighted while reading:
Each subdivision had its particular name: thus the children of blacks and whites were mulattos, a useful designation which nobody seems to employ in our morally opaque twenty-first century.
Of course, the friars knew that vestigial idolatry continued, but such offenses were punished with nothing more serious than the occasional whipping.
(Ah, yes, the 'nothing serious' of being whipped for trying to practice your own religion)
Many slaves seemed at that time to prefer white masters to their indigenous black ones. Most slaves were bought as such, having been enslaved in Africa.
(HOW WOULD YOU EVEN KNOW THAT FIRST CLAIM. What the hell sort of historical record is he using here? This line is, of course, not footnoted.)
(In which Thomas endorses a ridiculous Spanish claim that it was going to conquer all of China using only 12 ships:)
Had it been approved, it would have amounted to the grand climax of a hundred years of Spanish conquests and struggles. Had it happened, it would surely have brought less deprivation to China than occurred under the Manchu dynasty and certainly less than under the terrible communist era of the twentieth century.
But don't worry! Thomas does not restrain his bigotry to non-white races. He's got plenty of condescension for women too. He barely mentions them throughout the book, which – fine. It's a history of conquistadors. He could have made more of an effort, but I understand that he's working from a limited source. But every women that does get mentioned is "beautiful". I AM SO NOT KIDDING:
The new queen, still only fourteen years old, had a dark and Italian complexion, recalling her Medici forbears. She was vivacious and attractive (pg 27)
Philip's mother was the beautiful, strong-minded and unbending Empress Isabel (pg 28)
His famously one-eyed yet beautiful wife, Ana (pg 43)
She was born in 1586 and the Indian maid who looked after her in her cot as a baby saw that she had two beautifully formed roses on her cheeks. (pg 148)
The delightful conquistadora Mencia de Nidos, a woman as beautiful as she was brave (pg 153)
Ursua's beautiful mestiza mistress, Ines de Atienza. She was renowned in the 1550s as 'the most beautiful woman in Peru' (pg 212 - a two for one! )
Unfortunately the prior's mother was a beautiful conversa, Violante Gomes (pg 231)
The tale of the beautiful gallega Isabel de Barreto (pg 327)
Another daughter of Montezuma, the apparently beautiful Techuipo (pg 333)
(By the way, I gathered these by running a search on the text for 'she', and can report that both 'sheep' and metaphorical shes – countries and boats, mostly – far outnumber actual women.)
Thomas also spends multiple chapters eulogizing the work of friars, priests, and missionaries: the buildings they constructed, the books they wrote, the languages they learned, the numbers they converted, etc etc. In their turn, the work of nuns get this one paragraph out of the entire book:
The nuns included brillant cooks. They made pretty dresses for the ever-present images of the Virgin. They chanted charming cradle songs and were, from time to time, allowed to swoon in amorous ecstasy.
I could go on, but I think y'all get the point. But I do want to share one more quote: the final paragraph of the entire book, which I feel really puts a cap on all the crazy shit that came beforehand.
The Spanish empire lasted three centuries, from the early sixteenth to the early nineteenth century. Its last remnants only fell in 1898, following the Spanish-American war in Cuba, over 400 years after Columbus had embarked for the Caribbean. Spain had left behind a Catholic religion and innumerable monuments, a tradition and much literature. Above all, it had created dependencies which matured successfully into the new independent countries of Latin America. Wars in this region are rare. In comparison with the rest of the world, Latin America now seems an oasis of peace.
If I could give World Without End less than one star, I absolutely would. I want to give it negative stars.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
February 24, 2023
This is a very nice conclusion to the Spanish Empire trilogy. It covers the period of Spanish exploration during the period of the reign of Philip II. After the death of Charles V, Philip II takes over the exploration of the Americas. This talks briefly about who Philip was as a person, then goes straight to the matter in Mexico, then south the Peru, Venezuela, Argentina, Chile, etc. There is a great detail given to trade and trade efforts all over the continent. The brutality of the natives and how they were "civilized". He then heads further west to the Philippines (named after the Monarch) and then to China/Japan. I never knew that Spain thought about launching invasions from the Philippines into China to conquer them. Oh my how history would have been written differently!
January 29, 2016
The lead description Of Hugh Thomas' World Without End suggests the term "magisterial" for this work. I guess the appropriateness of that description depends on your definition. Certainly there is a monumental amount of research that went into the writing. But the result was for me disappointing. It is the equivalent of a long list of names, dates and places -- a much more compelling history of the Spanish empire is out there somewhere. For me, this work was short on analysis, insight and even the drama that well-written history provides the reader.
July 18, 2018
El tercero de la serie sobre el imperio español. Los dos anteriores trataron el período del inicio con los Reyes Católicos y las conquistas con Carlos V. Este se concentra en el reinado de Felipe II y como en los anteriores, Thomas abruma al lector con un alud de información que se concentra más en las colonias que en la España misma y sus problemas en Europa. Son tratados con amplitud los sucesos en México, Perú, el cono sur, las Filipinas e incluso los planes de invasión y conquista de China.
Puede ser una lectura percibida como pesada para el principiante, pero realmente se trata de una exposición destinada a dar un panorama general del imperio por medio de detalles y pequeñas piezas de información, como la aventura de Aguirre (llevada incluso al cine).
En fin, una buena experiencia para el lector.
Puede ser una lectura percibida como pesada para el principiante, pero realmente se trata de una exposición destinada a dar un panorama general del imperio por medio de detalles y pequeñas piezas de información, como la aventura de Aguirre (llevada incluso al cine).
En fin, una buena experiencia para el lector.
January 2, 2016
Well, this was a pretty damn disappointing book. Thomas is a historian from Britain who has written several books about Spain – many from its imperial heyday. So I was expecting this to be …..something more than it was, frankly.
Maybe my impressions going in were too high. That’s possible. But this book reminded me of a locally produced county history written in the 19th century, just on a grander scale. That’s not a good thing. What do I mean by that? Well, ever heard the story of a bunch of blindfolded men given a part of the elephant and asked to describe what they’re holding? One guy is given the tusk and has to describe it. One the tail. Another a leg. The point is they have a sense of their section of the elephant, but not much sense of the beast as a whole. This book felt a little like that. I never really got a grand overall sense of this first global empire. Here’s some chapters on Iberia. Now some on New Spain. Now some on Peru. Now some on the Paraguay region. Oh, here’s the Philippines. It was all so compartmentalized.
Even within the chapters, Thomas often takes a structural approach. For example, let’s look at the opening sections on the government in Iberia itself. Thomas primarily discusses the leading government institutions, and then describes the people in charge of them and their personalities. It reads more like a political science primer circa 1576. I had some sense of what the officials were like, but not much sense what Spain itself was like. Then you do that same approach for each other section. You learn about viceroys more than the territories they ruled sometimes. (This is what I mean when I say it’s like a county history. Those things were often compartmentalized histories focusing on the leading individuals in the county – because they’re the ones who financed the county history in the first place).
There are some interesting moments. You get the story of Aguirre (the man behind the Werner Herzog film). The most interesting thing from my perspective was how Spain intended to conquer China from the Philippines. Those in charge figured that if Cortes defeated the Aztec and Pizarro the Inca, why not us the Chinese? Wow, was that ever off. It was also under Philip II that Portugal became part of Spain. There was a dynastic dispute there, and he inserted himself in the middle of it. There are other nuggets here and there, but my overall reaction is one of considerable disappointment.
Yeah, this isn’t nearly what I was hoping for when I picked it up.
Maybe my impressions going in were too high. That’s possible. But this book reminded me of a locally produced county history written in the 19th century, just on a grander scale. That’s not a good thing. What do I mean by that? Well, ever heard the story of a bunch of blindfolded men given a part of the elephant and asked to describe what they’re holding? One guy is given the tusk and has to describe it. One the tail. Another a leg. The point is they have a sense of their section of the elephant, but not much sense of the beast as a whole. This book felt a little like that. I never really got a grand overall sense of this first global empire. Here’s some chapters on Iberia. Now some on New Spain. Now some on Peru. Now some on the Paraguay region. Oh, here’s the Philippines. It was all so compartmentalized.
Even within the chapters, Thomas often takes a structural approach. For example, let’s look at the opening sections on the government in Iberia itself. Thomas primarily discusses the leading government institutions, and then describes the people in charge of them and their personalities. It reads more like a political science primer circa 1576. I had some sense of what the officials were like, but not much sense what Spain itself was like. Then you do that same approach for each other section. You learn about viceroys more than the territories they ruled sometimes. (This is what I mean when I say it’s like a county history. Those things were often compartmentalized histories focusing on the leading individuals in the county – because they’re the ones who financed the county history in the first place).
There are some interesting moments. You get the story of Aguirre (the man behind the Werner Herzog film). The most interesting thing from my perspective was how Spain intended to conquer China from the Philippines. Those in charge figured that if Cortes defeated the Aztec and Pizarro the Inca, why not us the Chinese? Wow, was that ever off. It was also under Philip II that Portugal became part of Spain. There was a dynastic dispute there, and he inserted himself in the middle of it. There are other nuggets here and there, but my overall reaction is one of considerable disappointment.
Yeah, this isn’t nearly what I was hoping for when I picked it up.
April 21, 2018
I am currently researching the golden age of Spain, which was the reason I've picked this book. While it is obvious that the author knows his material, it was somewhat surprising to me how hard he tries to exonerate atrocities the Spaniards left in their wake in the South and Central America. Before my recent trip to Peru, I was able to research the conquest and its outcome. Well, it was one of the most horrifying examples of genocide in human history devised and manufactured by imperial Spain. With this in mind, I had a hard time following the author's attempts to justify what was done in Spanish colonies. He stated that Spain rebuilt and improved life in Peru and Mexico and how their native populations loved their fryars and how talented Spanish architects built beautiful cathedrals instead of pagan temples. I've heard and read very very different descriptions of what had happened there. I also saw the remains of the mind blowing Inca structures (what Spaniards were not able to destroy) and pieces of unique ancient art which somehow escaped greedy hands of Spaniards who melted most of them into bricks of gold to ship them back to Spain.
Overall, besides this major disagreement with the author, I felt that the book was very uneven and contained many unnecessary details which did not (in my opinion) contribute to the narrative. I am a very tolerant reader, but I sometimes was bored to death by long descriptions of minor nobles and their parents and their siblings and their cousins who at the end brought nothing to the story.
I forced myself to finish the book hoping that maybe at the end it would get better, but it did not. The epilogue reiterated how Spain "enlightened" the natives and brought peace (?) and prosperity (???) to the region. Frankly, I was speechless.
Overall, besides this major disagreement with the author, I felt that the book was very uneven and contained many unnecessary details which did not (in my opinion) contribute to the narrative. I am a very tolerant reader, but I sometimes was bored to death by long descriptions of minor nobles and their parents and their siblings and their cousins who at the end brought nothing to the story.
I forced myself to finish the book hoping that maybe at the end it would get better, but it did not. The epilogue reiterated how Spain "enlightened" the natives and brought peace (?) and prosperity (???) to the region. Frankly, I was speechless.
September 20, 2015
Full disclosure: I won this in a Goodreads giveaway. Hugh Thomas charts the fascinating rise of the Spanish Empire, beginning in the Americas with New Spain and ending with the Spanish dominion of the Philippines. The reach of Spain truly was global, with ambitions to go even further; at the end of the period under discussion, Spanish officials were making serious preparations for an invasion of China, an idea which gradually fell by the wayside. While moving through the mass of names in the work is occasionally challenging, gaining a better idea of the inner workings of the colonial government, and a more nuanced picture of Philip II, makes it well worth the effort.
November 7, 2024
In this concluding part of a trilogy written about Spanish Empire-building under the Habsburgs, specifically Charles I and Philip II of Spain, the Spanish reached the final stage of its empire-building in America, or the Indies, as they used to call it. The age of Conquistadors was well gone, and in its place were the Viceroys, Governors, Magistrates and all sorts of bureaucrats with Philip II, so-called the Bureaucrat King at its head.
This book was divided into four parts, the first part was dedicated to Philip's character, his close circles of advisors, and the drive behind his expansionist policies in America. The second part moved to Viceroyalties of New Spain, Peru and New Granada, and the conquests of Yucatan Peninsula, River Plate and Uruguay also mentioned. Third part discussed the establishment of Spanish Treasure Fleets, and the ever-present threats of British and French pirates to the gold-laden Spanish Galleons. The Fourth, and final part of the book deals with Spanish conquest of Philippines and its brushes with Ming Empire, with the book ending at Philip snuffing out the Spanish dream of China Conquest due to disaster of Spanish Armada's defeat to English Navy.
In the end, as I already described in the beginning, The age of conquistadors was well replaced by the age of colonial administrators, so the book would not be so action packed like the first two books, with Columbus Expedition and Cortes and Pizarro's conquests kind of thing. The madness of Lope de Aguirre might be the only sort of crazy adventure you could expect from this book. And also, like when reading the first two books, this book was filled with boatloads of characters, making me lost in who's who while reading it, a problem which probably, is characteristic of Hugh Thomas' works, since I met similar case on his work on Spanish Civil War. However, it was a trivial problem and I am quite sad that my reading of this series must come to an end.
This book was divided into four parts, the first part was dedicated to Philip's character, his close circles of advisors, and the drive behind his expansionist policies in America. The second part moved to Viceroyalties of New Spain, Peru and New Granada, and the conquests of Yucatan Peninsula, River Plate and Uruguay also mentioned. Third part discussed the establishment of Spanish Treasure Fleets, and the ever-present threats of British and French pirates to the gold-laden Spanish Galleons. The Fourth, and final part of the book deals with Spanish conquest of Philippines and its brushes with Ming Empire, with the book ending at Philip snuffing out the Spanish dream of China Conquest due to disaster of Spanish Armada's defeat to English Navy.
In the end, as I already described in the beginning, The age of conquistadors was well replaced by the age of colonial administrators, so the book would not be so action packed like the first two books, with Columbus Expedition and Cortes and Pizarro's conquests kind of thing. The madness of Lope de Aguirre might be the only sort of crazy adventure you could expect from this book. And also, like when reading the first two books, this book was filled with boatloads of characters, making me lost in who's who while reading it, a problem which probably, is characteristic of Hugh Thomas' works, since I met similar case on his work on Spanish Civil War. However, it was a trivial problem and I am quite sad that my reading of this series must come to an end.
October 11, 2021
The text of my edition of this book runs to less than 300 pages, but that reasonably brief overview somehow requires an index 40 double-column pages long. There are over a thousand individual names of people (men, mostly) referenced in that index, which means that a new person enters the narrative at the rate of roughly one every third of a page. The author can't simply say that a message is received; he has to give the name of the messenger, his place of origin and a quick run through his family history. The effect of this is that the reader cannot possibly remember everyone, and has no way of knowing in advance which of these many new characters will turn out to be a significant player.
The other effect is to make the text seem outrageously padded and badly-paced, with trivialities treated at length and momentous events sometimes dismissed in a few lines so that no narrative rhythm is ever sustained or built upon. He relates a fascinating tale, one that it would seem impossible to make boring. But he certainly does his best to do just that.
The other effect is to make the text seem outrageously padded and badly-paced, with trivialities treated at length and momentous events sometimes dismissed in a few lines so that no narrative rhythm is ever sustained or built upon. He relates a fascinating tale, one that it would seem impossible to make boring. But he certainly does his best to do just that.
November 12, 2022
So the moment came: I finished reading the Hugh Thomas trilogy about the Spanish Empire, which I started in 2016. The final book of the cycle is named “World Without End: Spain, Philip II, and the First Global Empire”.
It tells about the reign of Spanish king Philip II, who ruled in the second half of the 16th century. The story, as in previous instalments, essentially concentrates on the Latin conquests of Spain, along with the final stage of their exploration and the first steps in ordering their administration. Plus, there are chapters on the foundation of new colonies in Paraguay and Argentina, the conquest of the Philippine Islands, and the incorporation of Portugal into the Spanish Empire.
The book is rich in events and names of people who built a management system, travelled around the globe, made discoveries and, in fact, created the history of that century. At first, their number is daunting, but little by little, you are drawing into the author’s story, and you understand that he has done a colossal job.
I sincerely enjoyed reading the pages about geographic exploration in South America and the Pacific. It’s great to see how humanity has taken a step forward!
It tells about the reign of Spanish king Philip II, who ruled in the second half of the 16th century. The story, as in previous instalments, essentially concentrates on the Latin conquests of Spain, along with the final stage of their exploration and the first steps in ordering their administration. Plus, there are chapters on the foundation of new colonies in Paraguay and Argentina, the conquest of the Philippine Islands, and the incorporation of Portugal into the Spanish Empire.
The book is rich in events and names of people who built a management system, travelled around the globe, made discoveries and, in fact, created the history of that century. At first, their number is daunting, but little by little, you are drawing into the author’s story, and you understand that he has done a colossal job.
I sincerely enjoyed reading the pages about geographic exploration in South America and the Pacific. It’s great to see how humanity has taken a step forward!
May 17, 2020
The author made the egregious error of defending the Spanish empire instead of describing it. By the end, he suggested that Spanish rule would have been less devastating to China than other regimes for reasons. I put up with the author's idiosyncrasies in the previous books because he was an informative storyteller but this volume had few redeeming features. The author spent too much space on inconsequential details and not enough on important ones. For example, he devoted 2 chapters and 30 pages to an invasion of China that never happened and only 1 chapter with 10 pages to the actual conquest of the Philippines.
June 11, 2020
Somewhat late in life I've "discovered" Latin America and so have been looking for good general histories of the Spanish Conquest period.
While I found much in this (and its companion books) of great interest, in the end the entire series was thoroughly unsatisfying. Clearly the author is an expert in this field but these books would have benefited from an entirely more critical editing process. Finding the narrative and larger story in the midst of excessive pedantic details just becomes a hard slog.
While I found much in this (and its companion books) of great interest, in the end the entire series was thoroughly unsatisfying. Clearly the author is an expert in this field but these books would have benefited from an entirely more critical editing process. Finding the narrative and larger story in the midst of excessive pedantic details just becomes a hard slog.
October 2, 2020
Purchase World Without End here for just $15!
The final volume of Hugh Thomas' trilogy about the Spanish Empire, World Without End is an intelligent and insightful look at Spain through the perspective of Philip II. An interesting and fast-paced read.
Elisa - The Book Grocer
The final volume of Hugh Thomas' trilogy about the Spanish Empire, World Without End is an intelligent and insightful look at Spain through the perspective of Philip II. An interesting and fast-paced read.
Elisa - The Book Grocer
October 15, 2018
This history looks at the Spanish Empire in Latin America and Asia. The book begins with a discussion of conditions in Spain at the time, and then looks at the colonies and their relationship with the mother country. The book is well-written and insightful, but was a little hard to follow in some parts for someone unfamiliar with Spanish history and empire.
August 19, 2021
I was already getting irritated by the endless lists in this book, masquerading as analysis. But after 4 chapters of praise for an empire that exploited 3 continents, and committed acts of genocide and cultural extinction...to be told that it was a peaceful, efficient operation that reached an accommodation with native peoples made me want to vomit. No further reading of this book.
November 16, 2021
Perhaps not quite as entertaining as the first two volumes of the trilogy (largely because much of the story in the New World in this book focuses on administration vs. exploration and conquest). Good discussion at the end on how the Philippines came to be a part of the Spanish Empire in North America.
July 15, 2023
What an awful boring book. Too many names of insignificant people. Not enough context and zero drama.
I went into it with excitement. My chance to read about the Spanish Empire and how it was built.
Seeking interesting nuggets amidst the swamp of words just isn’t worth the effort. I doubt that even a historian professor would find much worth in this book.
August 2, 2017
Impressive research. I agree with some of the reviews that expressed a preference for more analysis. But, I was enlightened by learning about the extensiveness and legacy of the Spanish empire. Somehow, this was a hole in my historical education, so I benefited from reading the book.
May 18, 2022
I gave upon this book because it was filled with too much extraneous detail. After seeing the opera “Don Carlo” Iwanted to know more about Phillip II and his son, but this book was too much information for me.
September 7, 2023
You will find a factual error error 5 pages or so. One example, Thomas claims Florida was purchased by the US in 1845, this is wrong. Florida was purchased by the USA much earlier, it became a state in 1845.
February 25, 2020
(3.5 stars) It's a solid Spanish history book. Read a lot of bad revies about this title: it's not that bad. However, it has a little trouble making a single cohesive story with all it's characters.
August 16, 2024
ძალიან დეტალური, ძალიან მოსაწყენი vol.3
December 20, 2015
An engagingly written, fast-paced book it nonetheless took me awhile to finish. It's not the book, it's me. There's a danger in picking up the last in a 3-part history without having first read the other two. Again, that's my fault. But World Without End passed the stand-alone test with aplomb (perhaps not with "flying colors"). This is a treatment of the Spanish Empire through the prism of the reign of Philip II. Thomas maintains the view that Philip's death in 1598 marked the transition of the Spanish Empire from its expansionary phase to its administrative one. Colonial Spain has been much demonized for its brutality toward the indigenous people it conquered, with justification. Thomas argues, however, that the Spanish reputation for brutality is somewhat exaggerated by the fact that much of the history on the subject has been written from a British perspective. For his part, he points out more moderate voices like Bartolome de las Cases (who argued for better treatment of the Indians) and of the Franciscan orders. When discussing the history of colonial Spain, most people do not mention the Philippines, and this book made me wonder why. That conquest, as it were, was made with relatively less rapacity than those in the Americas, and was based more on trade than on pure extraction of resources. That the Spanish partially co-opted the administrative structure of the places they conquered (as empires generally do to one degree or another) is a given. The Empire at that time was beginning to wind down its expansionary phase, even as Spain had sights on China and Japan. World Without End closes by positing that in a way the Spanish Empire never really declined. Although it no longer formally exists, it remains in a strong linguistic and cultural sense in a large part of the world.
January 22, 2016
This is truly an excellent book. I was not very familiar with the Spanish Empire and it's conquest of the Americas. This was a very interesting account of Phillip II's enterprises in the American Hemisphere. This book is full of details and anecdotes. It does tend to read a bit dry, so if you are not a fan of pure history-then this may not be the book for you. However, if you are interested in Philip II or the Spanish Empire in America in the wake of the conquistadores then this is a great book for you.
January 2, 2016
This book had lots of interesting information as far as Spanish expansion in the sixteenth century. It was too detailed as far as names of people only mentioned once or twice that had no bearing in the over all picture. The author also enjoyed taking up space detailing where each person was born in relation to other people born ("xx was born in xx as was xx which is nearby the town of xx where xx and xx were also born").
Read
December 13, 2016Especially good history of the founding and working mechanics of the Spanish Empire, which was lacking in the last history of Spain that I read. A good counterpoint, in many ways, to the anti-Spanish sentiment in some parts of the Americas, as well as in the English-speaking world, its imperial rival for centuries. Learned a lot!
October 20, 2015
This was a very interesting book and on a subject that I was unfamiliar with.
September 11, 2016
I loved his book on Mexico. I found the topic of great interest and the expansion under philip II impressive. The 300 pages contained way too many names of personalities that I got lost.
October 2, 2016
Fascinating, but as the other volumes in this history of Spain, more details than are really necessary, which takes away from the flow of this important story.
June 4, 2017
Thomas cuts down on the encyclopedic writing, but maybe too much, as he glosses over the Spanish Armada, the Netherlands War, and Lepanto. Yet this is a far more nimble and more manageable read than any of the previous four books of this author which I've read.
With that in mind, the bits about colonial administration bored me.
Yet I give him huge kudos for his discussion of Spain in the Far East (Philippines and China), colonization in South America (Paraguay was fascinating), and English and French encroachment on Spain's territory. While he didn't cover Spain's short-lived colony on Formosa, Madrid's involvement in the Far East could be a whole new book.
Well worth it. Five stars for improvement and innovation.
With that in mind, the bits about colonial administration bored me.
Yet I give him huge kudos for his discussion of Spain in the Far East (Philippines and China), colonization in South America (Paraguay was fascinating), and English and French encroachment on Spain's territory. While he didn't cover Spain's short-lived colony on Formosa, Madrid's involvement in the Far East could be a whole new book.
Well worth it. Five stars for improvement and innovation.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews