" but Irving did indeed have a target -- medieval obscurantism,
associated in the early 19th-century American (protestant) mind
with Spain and Catholicism."
The same suggestion of anti-Catholic purpose is found in the
book _Inventing the Flat Earth_, by Jeffrey Burton Russell
(mentioned by Gordon Fisher on August 7).
I don't think this idea will stand up to investigation. The test case
is the ultra-Catholic aristocrat Roselly de Lorgues, whose
_Christophe Colomb: Histoire de sa vie et de ses voyages_
appeared in Paris in 1856. The work was encouraged, it was said,
by Pope Pius IX; it presented Columbus as the "Ambassador of God"
and a candidate for sainthood, and it went through at least 24
editions in five languages after its original publication. It does
accuse Irving (and the Catholic Navarrete and others) of
"semi-protestant ideas"; but that is because (1) they don't believe that
Columbus was led entirely by divine inspiration, and (2) they think
[as does everyone else] that he had an illegitimate son. Its subtitle
says that it is drawn "from authentic Spanish and Italian documents,"
and it presents nearly the same account of the confrontation as
Irving does.
William C. Waterhouse
Penn State