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The Oxford History of the United States #1
Contested Continent: The Struggle for North America, c. 1000-1680
The newest volume in the acclaimed Oxford History of the United States series, Contested Continent recounts the origins of "America" and how it came to birth the United States.
The Oxford History of the United States is by far the most respected multi-volume history of our nation. The series includes three Pulitzer Prize winners, two New York Times bestsellers, and winners of the Bancroft and Parkman Prizes. In the newest volume in the series, Peter C. Mancall recounts how North America was forged from the experiences of millions of Indigenous women and men as well as Europeans and Africans.
The first volume of the Oxford History of the United States series, Contested Continent is also the most ambitiously far-ranging history of North America concentrating on the period from c. 1000 to 1680, from the arrival of Norse explorers to an explosion of revolts that underlined the stubborn struggle to master the continent some two centuries after Columbus's landfall. This history spans the continent from the North Atlantic to the West Indies and includes the entire Atlantic basin. Mancall emphasizes the experiences of diverse peoples while, at the same time, telling a new story about the origins of major aspects of American culture. He illuminates the rise of a booming trans-Atlantic economy based on the extraction of abundant American natural resources; the central role that European migrants and their descendants played in the enslavement of Africans and the displacement of Indigenous peoples; and the spread of self-governing polities where many enjoyed religious freedom. None of these developments was inevitable. Conflicts broke out frequently as different peoples battled over precious resources. Europeans' appetites for material gain and expanding Christendom brought horrific consequences for those brutalized, enslaved, and vulnerable to infectious diseases.
This is a sweeping history of developments crucial to the eventual founding of the United States. Contested Continent underscores the titanic struggles between the peoples who had populated the Americas for centuries and the migrants from the Old World who initiated changes that created a New World that offered boundless opportunities for some and crushed the aspirations of others.
The Oxford History of the United States is by far the most respected multi-volume history of our nation. The series includes three Pulitzer Prize winners, two New York Times bestsellers, and winners of the Bancroft and Parkman Prizes. In the newest volume in the series, Peter C. Mancall recounts how North America was forged from the experiences of millions of Indigenous women and men as well as Europeans and Africans.
The first volume of the Oxford History of the United States series, Contested Continent is also the most ambitiously far-ranging history of North America concentrating on the period from c. 1000 to 1680, from the arrival of Norse explorers to an explosion of revolts that underlined the stubborn struggle to master the continent some two centuries after Columbus's landfall. This history spans the continent from the North Atlantic to the West Indies and includes the entire Atlantic basin. Mancall emphasizes the experiences of diverse peoples while, at the same time, telling a new story about the origins of major aspects of American culture. He illuminates the rise of a booming trans-Atlantic economy based on the extraction of abundant American natural resources; the central role that European migrants and their descendants played in the enslavement of Africans and the displacement of Indigenous peoples; and the spread of self-governing polities where many enjoyed religious freedom. None of these developments was inevitable. Conflicts broke out frequently as different peoples battled over precious resources. Europeans' appetites for material gain and expanding Christendom brought horrific consequences for those brutalized, enslaved, and vulnerable to infectious diseases.
This is a sweeping history of developments crucial to the eventual founding of the United States. Contested Continent underscores the titanic struggles between the peoples who had populated the Americas for centuries and the migrants from the Old World who initiated changes that created a New World that offered boundless opportunities for some and crushed the aspirations of others.
751 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 1, 2026
About the author
Peter C. Mancall
31 books28 followersA 1981 graduate of Oberlin college, Peter Mancall attended graduate school at Harvard University, where he received a Ph.D. in history in 1986. Mancall was a visiting Assistant Professor of History at Connecticut College from 1986 to 1987. After teaching as a Lecturer on History and Literature at Harvard for two years, he took a position at the University of Kansas in 1989. In 2001, Mancall took a position at the University of Southern California, where he helped to create the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute in 2003, becoming its first director. He has served on the editorial board of several journals, and from 2007 to 2009 he was Associate Vice Provost for Research Advancement at the University of Southern California.
Mancall has written five books and edited eight others, and written around forty book reviews in such journals as American Historical Review, Journal of American History, Journal of Economic History, Journal of the Early Republic, and many others. His newest book, Fatal Journey: The Final Expedition of Henry Hudson—A Tale of Mutiny and Murder in the Arctic was published by Basic Books on June 9, 2009. Mancall has accepted an offer to write Volume 1 of the Oxford History of the United States series covering American colonial history to c. 1680.
~from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_C....
Mancall has written five books and edited eight others, and written around forty book reviews in such journals as American Historical Review, Journal of American History, Journal of Economic History, Journal of the Early Republic, and many others. His newest book, Fatal Journey: The Final Expedition of Henry Hudson—A Tale of Mutiny and Murder in the Arctic was published by Basic Books on June 9, 2009. Mancall has accepted an offer to write Volume 1 of the Oxford History of the United States series covering American colonial history to c. 1680.
~from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_C....
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May 27, 2026Agreeing to write the first chronological volume of a project that is as widely distinguished as it is frustratingly prolonged is a courageous undertaking, especially when the primary material for most of this time period, c. 1000—1680, is sparse or nonexistent. In the past forty-four years, the Oxford History of the United States has maintained a reputation for respected, well-written histories, all of which I have read, though the publisher has received justified criticism for the limping pace. Apparently, two volumes yet remain to be completed; hopefully, that will happen within my lifetime.
Professor Mancall describes multiple European attempts to establish settlements in the New World, efforts that felt to this reader like sparks flung across the ocean, where some kindled and others died out. This story follows those sparks to eastern Canada, New England, the central Atlantic coast, the Caribbean and Florida, and the American Southwest, including Mexico. The conditions for new arrivals were harsh. I suppose that if word were to have spread throughout Europe of the health risks to be encountered across the Atlantic Ocean, few would have sailed westward. The difference between the growth of Spanish settlements and those of the French, English, Dutch, and even Swedes was striking, which I assume was a combination of the frenzied Spanish allure for gold and silver combined with more accommodating physical environments. The further north the Spanish ventured, into Florida for example, the less successful their experiences. Such were the difficulties that more than a century passed between the voyages of the earliest discoverers and the rise of appreciable European settlements in the lands now known as the United States.
Within North America, this era is largely devoid of the great artists, writers, politicians, generals, and scientists that serve to anchor many an engaging history. Instead, we meet explorers who were succeeded by colonists fighting for survival, and in a few cases, enrichment. Much suffering occurred among those early colonists, the Indigenous, and the enslaved. To provide a short glimpse into our compromised past, Professor Mancall writes of a significant Indigenous rebellion in New England in the 1670s:
Incidents like this were repeated with differing levels of intensity and frequency throughout these pages. What a chasm between these brutalities and our sustained puritan imaginings for early America. It is a wonder, then, that we do not choke on our Thanksgiving dinners each year. But the brutalities ranged 360 degrees, with no group, neither Indigenous nor European, beyond reproach. Clearly, the Europeans have the weaker moral position in retrospect being the uninvited ones who threatened Indigenous lands and ways of life, propelled variously with self-serving convictions, many religiously emboldened.
Slavery, involving both Indigenous and African souls, and the decimation of Indigenous Americans through disease and war are transgressions that can never receive a satisfactory accounting, shames that I believe our culture will carry in perpetuity, borne within our collective subconscious. The author treats both subjects at length. These days, too many appear to prefer ignoring the uncomfortable past, even deriding those who attempt to educate us. This book will be welcomed by those who are keen to part the comforting, rosy curtains, those curious to glance upon an unfamiliar, yet balanced, portrait of our nation’s formative years, a portrait that reminds us of the potential actions of unchecked human nature.
Professor Mancall describes multiple European attempts to establish settlements in the New World, efforts that felt to this reader like sparks flung across the ocean, where some kindled and others died out. This story follows those sparks to eastern Canada, New England, the central Atlantic coast, the Caribbean and Florida, and the American Southwest, including Mexico. The conditions for new arrivals were harsh. I suppose that if word were to have spread throughout Europe of the health risks to be encountered across the Atlantic Ocean, few would have sailed westward. The difference between the growth of Spanish settlements and those of the French, English, Dutch, and even Swedes was striking, which I assume was a combination of the frenzied Spanish allure for gold and silver combined with more accommodating physical environments. The further north the Spanish ventured, into Florida for example, the less successful their experiences. Such were the difficulties that more than a century passed between the voyages of the earliest discoverers and the rise of appreciable European settlements in the lands now known as the United States.
Within North America, this era is largely devoid of the great artists, writers, politicians, generals, and scientists that serve to anchor many an engaging history. Instead, we meet explorers who were succeeded by colonists fighting for survival, and in a few cases, enrichment. Much suffering occurred among those early colonists, the Indigenous, and the enslaved. To provide a short glimpse into our compromised past, Professor Mancall writes of a significant Indigenous rebellion in New England in the 1670s:
Natives who surrendered, including a group of 150 who turned themselves in at Plymouth, enjoyed no protection, especially those confined in the dismal conditions of Deer Island in Boston Harbor. Colonists sold them into slavery—all but one elderly man, whom they decapitated instead, rationalizing that this constituted more humane treatment than a life of bondage.
Incidents like this were repeated with differing levels of intensity and frequency throughout these pages. What a chasm between these brutalities and our sustained puritan imaginings for early America. It is a wonder, then, that we do not choke on our Thanksgiving dinners each year. But the brutalities ranged 360 degrees, with no group, neither Indigenous nor European, beyond reproach. Clearly, the Europeans have the weaker moral position in retrospect being the uninvited ones who threatened Indigenous lands and ways of life, propelled variously with self-serving convictions, many religiously emboldened.
Slavery, involving both Indigenous and African souls, and the decimation of Indigenous Americans through disease and war are transgressions that can never receive a satisfactory accounting, shames that I believe our culture will carry in perpetuity, borne within our collective subconscious. The author treats both subjects at length. These days, too many appear to prefer ignoring the uncomfortable past, even deriding those who attempt to educate us. This book will be welcomed by those who are keen to part the comforting, rosy curtains, those curious to glance upon an unfamiliar, yet balanced, portrait of our nation’s formative years, a portrait that reminds us of the potential actions of unchecked human nature.
June 25, 2026
Yet another left-wing interpretation of American history. Something I wrote in another review will be enough here:
American historians almost always produce awful history books about American history (like this one) because of their faith in the founding ideals of the country (equality, rights, freedom, human dignity, etc.), and their inability to detach themselves from them. No wonder then that their books on US history tend to be either delusional celebrations of America’s greatness (rarer these days) or extremely negative narratives that breed collective self-hatred or oikophobia. This book is very much of the latter type.
If Oxford is now publishing political propaganda like this as a reliable history book, then that just demonstrates how deeply entrenched leftist thought has become across western academic institutions.
American historians almost always produce awful history books about American history (like this one) because of their faith in the founding ideals of the country (equality, rights, freedom, human dignity, etc.), and their inability to detach themselves from them. No wonder then that their books on US history tend to be either delusional celebrations of America’s greatness (rarer these days) or extremely negative narratives that breed collective self-hatred or oikophobia. This book is very much of the latter type.
If Oxford is now publishing political propaganda like this as a reliable history book, then that just demonstrates how deeply entrenched leftist thought has become across western academic institutions.
Want to Read
May 29, 2026Oh no this book ends in 1680 when The Glorious Cause begins 1763. Does this mean we need to wait a decade for the rest of the colonial history?
June 10, 2026
This new book is the tenth volume of The Oxford History of the United States. It is a series that only a well-established university press could produce. The first volume was Robert Middlekauff's "The Glorious Cause", a history of the American Revolution. It was published in 1982.
Over the last 24 years the Oxford Press has been issuing new volumes at its own pace. Each volume is a long, well written, heavily footnoted history by a prominent historian on an era in American history. Three of the volumes have won Pulitzer Prizes for History.
The volumes have been issued as they were finished, not in chronological order. This volume, for example, is the first volume chronologically but the tenth one published. There are at least two more volumes in the works.
This is a brilliant historical work. Mancall tells the story of how Europeans found and then occupied the Americas and how they met and devasted the indigenous people of the Americas.
Despite the title, the book really begins with Columbus. Mancall describes the well-developed and complex world of the indigenous people in 1450. They occupied most of America. They had sophisticated religious systems. They frequently warred. They enslaved those they captured in war. They formed alliances. There was a thick culture through most of America.
Columbus and the Spanish invaders who followed him were ruthless towards indigenous people. They enslaved them, slaughtered them, and evicted them from their land. In the sixty years after Columbus' first voyage the native population on Hispaniola (modern day Hati and Dominican Republic) was reduced from three million to two hundred. One estimate is that the Spanish invaders killed between 12 and 15 million men, woman and children in the first forty years of colonization.
Despite the horrific stories, Mancall does not preach or pontificate. This is a history book. He calmly sets out what happened and footnotes his sources. There is no need for him to point out how horrible it was. It is obvious.
The heart of the book is the slow European conquest of the area of modern-day America. In overview, the Spanish tried to move upwards from Mexico into the Southwest and Florida. The English tried to establish permanent towns on the East Coast. The French tried to build settlements down the St. Lawrence River. The Dutch claimed New York. I did not know that in 1637 Sweden established a small settlement near the current site of Wilmington, Delaware.
Mancall focuses on a central contradiction in the way Europeans dealt with the indigenous people. All of the European nations insisted that their goal in conquering American territory was to convert the Indians to Christianity. In practice, in every case, the practice of the Europeans was to fight, kill, enslave and evict them.
This book is full of grand pledges to bring Christianity to the Indians. One of the subplots was the battle between Catholic and Protestant nations. Each thought it was essential to convert the Indians to their brand of Catholicism.
The plan to convert the indigenous people did not work for several reasons.
1) The actual settlers were driven by greed not faith. They wanted the Indians to mine silver, work plantations, trade furs. They didn't share the grand missionary dreams of the organizers of the colonies.
2) The Europeans were invading and occupying land that was lived on by other people. The Indians were not, by and large, convinced that the people taking their land were acting for religious reasons.
3) The Indians had their own religions. Mancall makes it clear that these people had sophisticated and complex religious beliefs. They were willing to add some Christians parts into their beliefs, but they were not willing to abandon their ancient beliefs.
Typically, the Europeans who founded a colony would negotiate with the local Indian tribes. They would form alliances. That peaceful co-operation would breakdown. The Indians would realize that these people intended to stay and grow. The colonist would realize that the Indians were not interested in adopting European society and beliefs. In almost every case, it ended in violence and battle between the indigenous people and the Europeans.
Infectious diseases were central to the European success. For example, in 1617 an epidemic killed 95% of the coastal Algonquin speaking Indians along the New England coast. In the next decade the Pilgrims and Puritans sailed into an abandoned land. The best guess is that the epidemic was caused by rats that escaped from Europeans fishing boats that stopped along the coast.
Mancall also tracks the rise of African slavery in America. The Spanish originally enslaved native people, but they quickly got to the point where they were importing African slaves. The sugar plantations in the Caribbean islands used a huge number of slaves. As the American south became settled and large plantations were established, the slave trade came to America. Mancall makes the point that there was no single point when a formal decision to allow slavery was made. In a very short time, slavery was an essential part of the American economy.
Mancall has marshaled and organized a huge amount of information. He is a very good storyteller. He gives us wonderful two- or three-page stories of great voyages or the founding of settlements. He is very good on the European background for what happens in America. Many of the decisions about America were made because of politics in Europe. This is a first-rate addition to a first-rate series.
The Europeans did not settle a wilderness. They invaded a civilization.
Over the last 24 years the Oxford Press has been issuing new volumes at its own pace. Each volume is a long, well written, heavily footnoted history by a prominent historian on an era in American history. Three of the volumes have won Pulitzer Prizes for History.
The volumes have been issued as they were finished, not in chronological order. This volume, for example, is the first volume chronologically but the tenth one published. There are at least two more volumes in the works.
This is a brilliant historical work. Mancall tells the story of how Europeans found and then occupied the Americas and how they met and devasted the indigenous people of the Americas.
Despite the title, the book really begins with Columbus. Mancall describes the well-developed and complex world of the indigenous people in 1450. They occupied most of America. They had sophisticated religious systems. They frequently warred. They enslaved those they captured in war. They formed alliances. There was a thick culture through most of America.
Columbus and the Spanish invaders who followed him were ruthless towards indigenous people. They enslaved them, slaughtered them, and evicted them from their land. In the sixty years after Columbus' first voyage the native population on Hispaniola (modern day Hati and Dominican Republic) was reduced from three million to two hundred. One estimate is that the Spanish invaders killed between 12 and 15 million men, woman and children in the first forty years of colonization.
Despite the horrific stories, Mancall does not preach or pontificate. This is a history book. He calmly sets out what happened and footnotes his sources. There is no need for him to point out how horrible it was. It is obvious.
The heart of the book is the slow European conquest of the area of modern-day America. In overview, the Spanish tried to move upwards from Mexico into the Southwest and Florida. The English tried to establish permanent towns on the East Coast. The French tried to build settlements down the St. Lawrence River. The Dutch claimed New York. I did not know that in 1637 Sweden established a small settlement near the current site of Wilmington, Delaware.
Mancall focuses on a central contradiction in the way Europeans dealt with the indigenous people. All of the European nations insisted that their goal in conquering American territory was to convert the Indians to Christianity. In practice, in every case, the practice of the Europeans was to fight, kill, enslave and evict them.
This book is full of grand pledges to bring Christianity to the Indians. One of the subplots was the battle between Catholic and Protestant nations. Each thought it was essential to convert the Indians to their brand of Catholicism.
The plan to convert the indigenous people did not work for several reasons.
1) The actual settlers were driven by greed not faith. They wanted the Indians to mine silver, work plantations, trade furs. They didn't share the grand missionary dreams of the organizers of the colonies.
2) The Europeans were invading and occupying land that was lived on by other people. The Indians were not, by and large, convinced that the people taking their land were acting for religious reasons.
3) The Indians had their own religions. Mancall makes it clear that these people had sophisticated and complex religious beliefs. They were willing to add some Christians parts into their beliefs, but they were not willing to abandon their ancient beliefs.
Typically, the Europeans who founded a colony would negotiate with the local Indian tribes. They would form alliances. That peaceful co-operation would breakdown. The Indians would realize that these people intended to stay and grow. The colonist would realize that the Indians were not interested in adopting European society and beliefs. In almost every case, it ended in violence and battle between the indigenous people and the Europeans.
Infectious diseases were central to the European success. For example, in 1617 an epidemic killed 95% of the coastal Algonquin speaking Indians along the New England coast. In the next decade the Pilgrims and Puritans sailed into an abandoned land. The best guess is that the epidemic was caused by rats that escaped from Europeans fishing boats that stopped along the coast.
Mancall also tracks the rise of African slavery in America. The Spanish originally enslaved native people, but they quickly got to the point where they were importing African slaves. The sugar plantations in the Caribbean islands used a huge number of slaves. As the American south became settled and large plantations were established, the slave trade came to America. Mancall makes the point that there was no single point when a formal decision to allow slavery was made. In a very short time, slavery was an essential part of the American economy.
Mancall has marshaled and organized a huge amount of information. He is a very good storyteller. He gives us wonderful two- or three-page stories of great voyages or the founding of settlements. He is very good on the European background for what happens in America. Many of the decisions about America were made because of politics in Europe. This is a first-rate addition to a first-rate series.
The Europeans did not settle a wilderness. They invaded a civilization.
June 6, 2026
Huge book. Very informative and well researched. Excellent source for reference guide. History buffs will appreciate. Thank you to Goodreads Giveaways and Oxford for this book.
June 24, 2026
Phenomenal book!!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews