For thirty years Ben Kiernan has been deeply involved in the study of genocide and crimes against humanity. He has played a key role in unearthing confidential documentation of the atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge. His writings have transformed our understanding not only of twentieth-century Cambodia but also of the historical phenomenon of genocide. This new book₂the first global history of genocide and extermination from ancient times₂is among his most important achievements.

List of maps --Introduction -- pt. 1. Early imperial expansion -- 1. Classical genocide and early modern memory -- 2. The Spanish conquest of the new world, 1492-1600 -- 3. Guns and genocide in East Asia, 1400-1600 -- 4. Genocidal massacres in early modern Southeast Asia -- pt. 2. Settler colonialism -- Introductory note -- 5. The English conquest of Ireland, 1565-1603 -- 6. Colonial North America, 1600-1776 -- 7. Genocidal violence in nineteenth-century Australia -- 8. Genocide in the United States -- 9. Settler genocides in Africa, 1830-1910 -- pt. 3. Twentieth-century genocides -- Introductory note -- 10. The Armenian genocide : national chauvinism in the waning Ottoman empire -- 11. Blut und Boden : Germany and nazi genocide -- 12. Rice, race, and empire : Japan and East Asia -- 13. Soviet terror and agriculture -- 14. Maoism in China : a rural model of revolutionary violence -- 15. From the Mekong to the Nile : genocide in Cambodia and Rwanda -- Epilogue : racial and religious slaughter from Bangladesh to Baghdad -- Notes -- Acknowledgments -- Index.