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The Rise of the Black Magus in Western Art.Paul H. D. Kaplan

This challenge to the very citadel of received orthodoxy is highly invigorating, in spite of the demands imposed by Morineau on his readers; and given the current anti-determinist revisionism in so many fields of historical inquiry, the timing of his book could hardly be bettered. If his conclusions, as he insists, have hitherto been systematically ignored, this is unlikely to occur again, now that they are assembled under one cover, in however unwieldy a form. But are his conclusions correct? He explains with great frankness the possible deficiencies of the gazettes as a source, and he discusses in detail the problem of contraband, which massively complicates any attempt at statistical precision. But it is worrying, in particular, that he has eschewed any attempt to investigate the archives in Spain itself. While he makes a strong case for giving credence to the gazettes over official sources, as reflecting the informed opinions of shrewd Seville merchants, doubts are bound to linger as long as we lack a systematic investigation of all surviving figures and their close correlation on a yearly basis. For example, his gazette figures for the silver in the 163 3 treasure fleets are virtually identical to those which I found in a relation conserved in the Archive of the Indies (which would suggest that this was the original source), but for the king's share of the treasure are markedly higher than the figures given in another relation that was sent by officials to the Council of Finance, and is now in the archive of Simancas. Which set of figures are we to believe, and why? This is a task to challenge a whole team of historians, and one that may never be satisfactorily accomplished. But now that Morineau, like one crying in the wilderness, has again uttered his urgent message, questions that appeared settled are thrown open afresh to debate, and neither Hamilton's influential tables and graphs, nor the economic history of Early Modern Europe, will ever look quite the same again.