Description

WINNER OF THE 2025 PULITZER PRIZE FOR HISTORY
WINNER OF THE 2024 CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE
Winner of the Bancroft Prize 2025
Winner of the Mark Lynton History Prize 2025

For centuries, Europeans assumed that indigenous Americans lacked the sophistication to build cities and establish hierarchies. For over a millennium, prior to and after the arrival of white colonialists, however, native nations had been adapting to changing climates, founding and abandoning urban centres and forging complex, democratic societies.

In this magisterial new history of North America, Kathleen DuVal puts indigenous people back at the heart of the story. From the splendour of ancient cities like Cahokia and Moundsville to the careful diplomacy of native leaders in the face of colonial expansion, Native Nations reveals the diversity of indigenous civilisation and shows how a 1,000-year legacy still shapes America today, in struggles over sovereignty, climate and indigenous rights.

Publisher Review

A magisterial overview of a thousand years of Native American history * New York Review of Books * An essential American history … DuVal fuses a millennium of Native American history into a thought-provoking, persuasive whole * Wall Street Journal * An indispensable guide to the epic history of Native North America — Caroline Dodds Pennock, author * On Savage Shores * Both majestic in scope and intimate in tone … No single volume can adequately depict the gamut of Indigenous cultures, but DuVal’s comes close * Minneapolis Star-Tribune * Sweeping and important … It is hard to imagine a more learned and humane guide to the last thousand years of this story than DuVal * American Scholar *