Robert Southey did not exaggerate when he described the England of his day as" e; South
American mad." e; As Spain's hold on its colonies progressively weakened during the late�…

During the first half of the 1820s, Britain experienced a veritable craze for speculation in the
newly independent states of Spanish America. Then, in December of 1825, the bubble burst�…

William Swainson published descriptions and illustrations of many new forms of New World
birds. In some of his earlier papers, Swainson cited his own works (of which only some parts�…

In 1830, British Commander Robert Fitz-Roy led a personal mission to indoctrinate four
Patagonians captured in Tierra del Fuego. His project consisted of redeeming their still�…

During the first decades of the twentieth century, a number of US architects, designers and
patrons looked to the art and architecture of the pre-Columbian Americas for inspiration�…

Egypt has long been a presence in Western culture, and images of Egypt have been a mass-
culture staple since the nineteenth century. Based upon information gleaned from isolated�…