On the eve of the Seven Years' War in North America; the British crown convened the Albany Congress; an Anglo-Iroquois treaty conference; in response to a crisis that threatened imperial expansion. British authorities hoped to address the impending collapse of Indian trade and diplomacy in the northern colonies; a problem exacerbated by uncooperative; resistant colonial governments. In the first book on the subject in more than forty-five years; Timothy J. Shannon definitively rewrites the historical record on the Albany Congress. Challenging the received wisdom that has equated the Congress and the plan of colonial union it produced with the origins of American independence; Shannon demonstrates conclusively the Congress's importance in the wider context of Britain's eighteenth-century Atlantic empire. In the process; the author poses a formidable challenge to the Iroquois Influence Thesis. The Six Nations; he writes; had nothing to do with the drafting of the Albany Plan; which borrowed its model of constitutional union not from the Iroquois but from the colonial delegates' British cousins.Far from serving as a dress rehearsal for the Constitutional Convention; the Albany Congress marked; for colonists and Iroquois alike; a passage from an independent; commercial pattern of intercultural relations to a hierarchical; bureaucratic imperialism wielded by a distant authority.
#1637611 in Books Jan Assmann 2014-10-21Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.54 x 1.18 x 6.16l; .0 #File Name: 0801479738504 pagesDeath and Salvation in Ancient Egypt
Review
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Very good!By LRAnother quality book by Mr. Assmann. Everything I've read by this author is well worth it. Those without a lot of background in Egyptology will find it accessible; and those with familiarity will learn aspects they did not consider or were unaware of. Well researched and well written.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Five StarsBy MR S BULLTransformative. A powerful book.14 of 16 people found the following review helpful. Eye-openerBy Timothy J. SmithI have been reading a great deal about the Osiris myth; this; together with Tom Hare's book "Re-Membering Osiris" are truly valuable additions to anyone's Egyptology collection. Mr. Assman is a well-established author; and lays on the footnotes with scholarly frequency. His books are dense and a bit dry; but his viewpoint is clearly stated and provocative. I do not agree with his atheism; and find it a bit odd in a man who spends so much time writing about Gods and religion; but I will say that he is stunningly observant and objective in his recounting of the pure source material available to us today. Because his own perspective is clear and unapologetic; it is easy to examine his thoughts and observations from another perspective. Few writers so consistently provoke creative thought in the reader while informing and educating at the same time. Of the books he's written (and that I've read) this book is second only to "The Mind of Ancient Egypt" . Buy both! read them!!
