Nicholas Griffiths is the author of Cross and the Serpent: Religious Repression and Resurgence in Colonial Peru (1996) and Sacred Dialogues: Christianity and Native Religions in the Colonial Americas 1492–1700 (2017) which is now in its second edition.

• Introduction page; 1. The tradition of the apotheosis in early Spanish America; 2. The tradition of the apotheosis in Mesoamerica; 3. The tradition of the apotheosis in the Andes; 4. The European mythology of the indies – from the sixteenth to the early eighteenth century; 5. The tradition of the apotheosis in North America; 6. The European mythology of the indies – the enlightenment; 7. The tradition of the apotheosis in Hawaiʻi; Conclusion.

'Griffiths has achieved a rare feat: to revisit well-trodden ground from an astonishingly fresh perspective. At every stage, he forces us to re-think our deep-rooted preconceptions of what non-European peoples have made of the strange and often terrifying intruders that began to disrupt their worlds in increasing numbers from the late fifteenth century onwards. Marked by impeccable scholarship and disciplined imagination, Fallen from Heaven will become an indispensable reference point for anyone interested in re-imagining the period anachronistically called 'The Age of Discovery'.' Fernando Cervantes, author of Conquistadores: A New History