This epic history compares the empires built by Spain and Britain in the Americas, from Columbus' arrival in the New World to the end of Spanish colonial rule in the early nineteenth century. J. H. Elliott, one of the most distinguished and versatile historians working today, offers us history on a grand scale, contrasting the worlds built by Britain and by Spain on the ruins of the civilizations they encountered and destroyed in North and South America. Elliott identifies and explains both the similarities and differences in the two empires' processes of colonization, the character of their colonial societies, their distinctive styles of imperial government, and the independence movements mounted against them. Based on wide reading in the history of the two great Atlantic civilizations, the book sets the Spanish and British colonial empires in the context of their own times and offers us insights into aspects of this dual history that still influence the Americas.

Sir John Huxtable Elliott, FBA (23 June 1930 - ), who normally publishes as J.H. Elliott, is an eminent historian, Regius Professor Emeritus in the University of Oxford and Honorary Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford and Trinity College, Cambridge.

Born in Reading, Berkshire, Elliott was educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge. He was a lecturer in History at Cambridge University from 1957 to 1967, and was subsequently Professor of History at King's College, London between 1968 and 1973. In 1972 he was elected to the Fellowship of the British Academy. Elliott was Professor in the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey from 1973 to 1990, and was Regius Professor of Modern History, Oxford between 1990 and 1997. He is an Honorary Professor of History at the University of Warwick and an Hon DLitt (Warwick), and a Fellow of the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford.

An eminent Hispanist, he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award in 1996 for his contributions to the Social Sciences. For his outstanding contributions to the history of Spain and the Spanish Empire in the early modern period, Elliott was awarded the Balzan Prize for History, 1500–1800, in 1999. His studies of the Iberian Peninsula and the Spanish Empire helped the understanding of the problems confronting 16th and 17th century Spain, and the attempts of its leaders to avert its decline.

He is considered, together with Raymond Carr and Angus Mackay, a major figure in developing Spanish historiography.