The ill-treatment of Amerindians, which also occurred in other European colonies in the Americas, was used in works of competing European powers to create animosity against the Spanish Empire. De las Casas' work was first cited in English in the 1583 The Spanish Colonie, or Brief Chronicle of the Actes and Gestes of the Spaniards in the West Indies, at a time when England was preparing for war against Spain in the Netherlands.