Matthew Restall

Matthew Restall is an historian whose scholarship focuses on four areas of specialization: the history of the Aztecs, the Maya, and colonial Mesoamerica; the Spanish Conquest era in the Americas; the African Diaspora in Spanish America; and the history of popular music.

Restall’s work on Maya history includes The Maya World (1997), Maya Conquistador (1998), and the co-authored volumes Mesoamerican Voices (2005) and Return to Ixil (2019). His books on Afro-Spanish America include two edited volumes, Beyond Black and Red (2005) and Black Mexico (2009), and a monograph, The Black Middle: Africans, Mayas, and Spaniards in Colonial Yucatan, that won the 2009 CLAH prize for best book on Mexican history. He is a founder of the New Conquest History, to which he has contributed Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest (published in five languages), Invading Guatemala (2007, in Penn State Press’ Latin American Originals series, of which he is founding editor), and his co-authored The Conquistadors (published in four languages). The newest, When Montezuma Met Cortés: A True History of the Meeting that Changed History (2018), also available in Spanish and in Chinese, won the 2020 Cline Prize for best book on Indigenous history.

Restall’s latest books include three collaborations with art historian Amara Solari: The Friar and the Maya (winner of the 2023 CLAH prize for best book on Mexican history); The Maya (2020, in Oxford’s Very Short Introductions series, also now in Chinese); and The Maya Apocalypse and its Western Roots (2021). Also recent is the updated edition of Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest (2021; 2022 in Chinese), and Entre Mayas y Españoles (a 2020 translation of The Black Middle). Following his entry into the field of pop music history with Blue Moves (2020, in the 33 1/3 series) are two new monographs: Ghosts: Journeys to Post-pop (December 2024), and On Elton John (out this March in Oxford’s Opinionated Guides series). Meanwhile, in October, Norton will publish his latest monograph on a non-musical topic: The Nine Lives of Christopher Columbus. He is currently writing a book on the early history of Belize.

Restall has written two textbooks with Kris Lane: Latin America in Colonial Times (2011; 2018) and The Riddle of Latin America (2011). He and Lane are editors of Cambridge University Press’s Cambridge Latin American Studies book series. He was senior co-editor of Ethnohistory (2007-2016) and of the Hispanic American Historical Review (2017-2022). The recipient of three full-year National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowships, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Leverhulme Visiting Professorship, Restall has also held fellowships at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and at Brown University’s John Carter Brown Library (JCB). He has been a fellow at the Library of Congress, at the US Capitol (twice), at the University of London, and a visiting scholar at Dumbarton Oaks. In 2020 he was Greenleaf Distinguished Chair of Latin American Studies at Tulane University. He served on the Board of Governors of the JCB for 2014-23, and he is a Past President of the American Society for Ethnohistory.

Recent Publications (Books):

The Nine Lives of Christopher Columbus. New York: W.W. Norton, 2025.

On Elton John. New York: Oxford University Press, 2025.

Ghosts. Journeys into Post-pop. Tewkesbury, UK: Sonicbond Publishing, 2024

馬雅:被誤解的中美洲文明 / The Maya.  Nanjing: Yilin Press, 2024.

The Friar and the Maya: Diego de Landa and the Account of the Things of Yucatan (with Amara Solari, John F. Chuchiak, and Traci Ardren). Louisville: University Press of Colorado, 2023.

印第安帝国的覆灭. Shanghai: Dook Publishing, 2023. 

馬雅:被誤解的中美洲文明. Taipei: Sunrise Press, 2022.

西班牙征服的七个神话. Shanghai: People’s Publishing House, 2022.

The Maya Apocalypse and its Western Roots. With Amara Solari. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2021.

Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest, Updated Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021.

The Maya: A Very Short Introduction (with Amara Solari). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020.

Entre Mayas y Españoles: Africanos en el Yucatán Colonial. Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2020.

Blue Moves. 33 1/3 series. New York: Bloomsbury, 2020.

Return to Ixil: Maya Society in an Eighteenth-Century Yucatec Town (with Mark Christensen). Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2019.

Cuando Moctezuma conoció a Cortés. Mexico City: Taurus, 2019.

When Montezuma Met Cortés: The True Story of the Meeting that Changed History. New York: Ecco, 2018.

Latin America in Colonial Times (with Kris Lane). 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge: University Press, 2018.

Конкуридаторите. Sofia: Ashur, 2017.

I Sette Mitti Della Conquista Spagnola. Palermo: 21 Editore, 2017.

Conquista de Buenas Palabras y de Guerra: una visión indígena de la conquista (with Michel Oudijk). Mexico City: UNAM, 2014.

Los Conquistadores (with Felipe Fernández-Armesto). Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 2013.

The Conquistadors: A Very Short Introduction (with Felipe Fernández-Armesto). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.

The Riddle of Latin America (with Kris Lane). Boston: Cengage, 2011.

2012 and the End of the World: The Western Roots of the Maya Apocalypse (with Amara Solari). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2011.

The Black Middle: Africans, Mayas, and Spaniards in Colonial Yucatan. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009.

Awards and Service:

Fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities (2023-24)

Kislak Fellowship, Kluge Center, Library of Congress (2017)

Capitol Fellowship, US Capitol Historical Society (2017)

Membership, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton; Saunders Fellowship, John Carter Brown Library, Brown University (2013-14)

Fellowship, Institute for the Arts and Humanities, Pennsylvania State University (2011)

Faculty Scholar Award for Outstanding Achievement, Pennsylvania State University (2007)

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship (2003-2004)

NEH Fellowship, John Carter Brown Library, Brown University (2001-2002)

Recent Courses:

HIST178 – Colonial Latin American History
HIST011 – World History II
HIST197H – The End of the World: The History of Apocalyptic Thought
HIST302W – Undergraduate Seminar
HIST569 – Seminar in Latin American History