*A 1598 engraving by [Theodor de Bry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodor_de_Bry "Theodor de Bry") depicting a Spaniard feeding slain Indigenous American women and children to his dogs.* A propagandistic history of Spanish colonialism in the New World, propounded by Spain's European enemies, that depicted the Spaniards as sadistic and indiscriminate killers of native peoples. Although there was some truth to the claims made by the Protestant adversaries of Catholic Spain (and the Holy Roman Empire, which shared a ruler with Spain), there was also a lot of out-and-out falsehood. In some cases, exaggerations of the Spanish brutality were based on misunderstandings such as [[Dan's History Web/US 1/Topic Index/Bartolomé de Las Casas]]'s belief that [[Dan's History Web/US 1/Topic Index/Caribbean]] islands such as [[Dan's History Web/US 1/Topic Index/Hispaniola]] and Cuba had been depopulated by oppression. There had in fact been a lot of oppression, but Las Casas had not understood the effects of the diseases brought to the Americas inadvertently by Europeans as part of the [[Dan's History Web/US 1/Topic Index/Columbian Exchange]]. In any event, the results of Protestant colonialism in the New World were not all that different from those of the Catholic Spanish.