The History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles the Fifth; Volume 2
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History of the Conquest of Peru; With a Preliminary View of the Civilization of the Incas Volume 23
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As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
History of the Reign of Philip the Second;; Volume 1
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As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
William Hickling Prescott was an American historian.
Background
He was born on May 4, 1796 in Salem, Massachussets, United States, the eldest of the seven children of Judge William Prescott and Catherine Greene (Hickling). A descendant of John Prescott, who settled in New England in 1640, he was the grandson of Col. William Prescott of Bunker Hill.
The boyhood and youth of Prescott were singularly carefree and happy. His vivacity and wit made him universally popular, and his parents were able to afford him ample means to satisfy his individual tastes.
Education
Even before he went to college there is evidence that he was fond of reading; but his record at Harvard - where he entered as a sophomore in the class of 1814, and lived in the room that his father had occupied before him - was not particularly distinguished; certainly joie de vivre, rather than scholastic eminence, was at the outset the dominant note. He was given the degree of D. C. L. at Oxford.
Career
He was assured by his physicians that he could attempt a literary career instead of a military one. The conviction that he had chosen wisely was strengthened during a trip to Europe in the years 1815-17. Most of his time was spent, convalescing, on his grandfather's estates in the Azores, but he also visited Italy, France, and England, and in London he bought his first noctograph.
On his return to Boston he began a thorough and extensive course of preparation in the history and literature of the principal countries of western Europe. Most of the books had to be read aloud to him by paid secretaries, though he always insisted on having at least a look at them himself; and it is not improbable that his enforced abandonment of German, because the script was impossible for his eyes, was a contributory cause of his turning his attention to Spain.
In 1821 the first fruits of his patient, arduous labors began to appear - first in the form of reviews and articles on literary and historical subjects in the North American Review. During the next fifteen years a whole series of essays followed, the most important of which were collected and published in 1845 in a volume entitled Biographical and Critical Miscellanies. Of these the first and, in some respects, the most interesting is his "Life of Charles Brockden Brown, " which he undertook for The Library of American Biography.
The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic appeared, in three volumes. Any doubts which the author may have entertained in regard to its sale were speedily dispelled. Three-fifths of the first edition were sold in Boston before a copy could be sent to New York, and the whole edition was exhausted in five weeks. In view of the position and popularity of the author in the literary society of the Boston of that day this triumph was perhaps inevitable. The reviews were unanimously favorable.
The year after the publication of Ferdinand and Isabella was largely one of enforced idleness for Prescott, owing to severe attacks of the inflammation in his eye; but neither the pain of his malady nor the increased restrictions which its progress entailed could induce him permanently to desist from his labors, or to rest on the laurels he had already won. He decided that he would next devote himself to the history of the conquests of Mexico and Peru - themes which formed natural sequels to the work which he had already done. The two volumes of the History of the Conquest of Peru were written at a rapid rate; two years apparently were sufficient for the actual composition, though the work was not published until March 1847.
In 1845 he was chosen to fill the vacancy caused by the death of the Spanish historian Martin Fernandez de Navarrete, in the Institut de France; and constant invitations from his many European admirers and correspondents persuaded him at last to visit England for a few months in the summer of 1850.
As far back as 1838 there are evidences that Prescott contemplated writing a history of the reign of Philip the Second. In 1842 he had begun to collect materials for it. In February 1849 he drew up a sort of preliminary outline of the work in four volumes; on July 26 of the same year he began the composition of it. The three volumes of the History of the Reign of Philip the Second which were published (the first two in 1855, the last in 1858) deal principally with the rebellion of the Moriscos, the battle of Lepanto, the beginnings of the Escorial, the Don Carlos episode, and the troubles in the Low Countries. In 1856, moreover, he interrupted his researches into the reign of Philip to prepare a new edition of William Robertson's The History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles the Fifth (1857), with a continuation, "The Life of Charles the Fifth after His Abdication. "
On the morning of January 28, 1859, after a happy chat with his wife, he withdrew to the library in his Beacon Street home, where he was stricken with apoplexy and died within a few hours.
Achievements
William Hickling Prescott is widely recognized by historiographers to have been the first American scientific historian. He suffered from serious visual impairment, however became one of the most eminent historians of 19th century America, he specialized in late Renaissance Spain and the early Spanish Empire. His greatest works: The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic, The History of the Conquest of Mexico and others. His most strong sides as a historian, that brought him sucess, were his exhaustive, careful, and systematic use of archives, balanced judgments and his lively writing style.
The City of Prescott in Arizona was named in his honor. Colegio Anglo Americano Prescott, a school in Arequipa, Peru, also bears his name.
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Politics
Politically, his sympathies were those of a conservative Whig, but there is no evidence until the very close of his life that he was vitally interested in any of the great issues of his time. In 1856, however, he voted for John C. Fremont, an act which, in view of the political tenets of his most intimate friends, demanded high courage and independence.
Views
History for Prescott was primarily a form of polite literature, written quite as much for the entertainment as for the instruction of his readers; it was, therefore, in the recounting of stirring events and thrilling scenes that he took pleasure and excelled. He was too scrupulous to omit all consideration of social, constitutional, and economic problems, but it is only too obvious that they did not really interest him, and that he seldom inquired into the significance of the facts he set down.
Membership
In 1945 he was elected as corresponding member of the Royal Academy of Berlin.
Personality
He had acute inflammation of his right eye as well. Never again was he able to use his eye, save with extreme caution, for short periods, and at the cost of much pain; at intervals he was to all intents and purposes totally blind.
Tall, erect, and handsome, Prescott succeeded to an unusual degree in retaining his youthful appearance until after he had passed fifty. The gayety and charm which had been his most prominent traits in his boyhood never deserted him; in spite of his increasing blindness, he was from first to last a universal social favorite.
His charity and generosity to the poor were almost proverbial in the Boston of his day. One of his secretaries told, that he regularly gave away one-tenth of his income, most of it, no doubt, to deserving institutions, of which his favorite was the Perkins Institution for the Blind, but a goodly portion of it also to private pensioners. With all these popular and lovable qualities there was united an abundance of sterner stuff. The rigorous self-discipline to which Prescott had been obliged to submit himself in order to carry out his chosen work is ample proof of it.
Quotes from others about the person
"If I were asked, " said Theophilus Parsons, "to name the man whom I have known whose coming was most sure to be hailed as a pleasant event by all whom he approached, I should not only place Prescott at the head of the list, but I could not place any other man near him".
"All who knew him, " declared his friend, George Bancroft, in a tribute delivered before the New York Historical Society two weeks after Prescott's death, "will say, that he was himself greater and better than his writings. Standing as it were by his grave, we cannot recall anything in his manner, his character, his endowments, or his conduct, we could wish changed. "
Connections
He married Susan Amory, the daughter of Thomas Coffin Amory and Hannah Rowe Linzee, on May 4, 1820. They had two sons and a daughter.
