Christopher Heaney's book 'Empires of the Dead' documents half a millennium of relationships between the living and dead in America. In the 17th century, Spanish priests sought out mummies and sought out paganism, writes Heaney.

Heaney reconstructs the history of colonization, capitalism and the birth of anthropology, and exposes the emotions and actions that the pre-Hispanic dead have inspired in the alive world. The answer has to do with who looks, who is looked at and the historical context of the contact.