Ethnographer's Sketch, Sensational Engraving, Full-Length Portrait: Print Genres for Spanish America in Girolamo Benzoni, the De Brys, and Cesare Vecellio

The writer-illustrators Giorgio Benzoni and Cesare Vecellio, using the New World as the topic for books in different genres intended to appeal to different audiences, represented the inhabitants of New Spain in prints and commentary derived from an ethnographic perspective on their customs and, in Vecellio's case, from an aesthetic focus on their clothing. In contrast, the De Brys' version of New Spain as presented in parts 3–5 of their America series launched a vivid, sensationalist assault on their readers' curiosity, playing to their fascination with the horrors of New World exploration and the savagery of its inhabitants. This essay compares these three discourses, the genres they underpin, and the diverse kinds of appeal they were designed to make to book-buying audiences in Europe.