An American scholar and author has won this year’s $75,000 McGill University history book prize.

55 year old Camilla Townsend is a professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey. She was named winner of Cundill History Prize for “Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs.”

The jury hailed the author for recasting history through the eyes of the Indigenous people rather than those of their Spanish conquerors.

The International Cundill prize, which is run by the Montreal University, recognizes non-fiction history writing in English.

The runners-up, who each receive $10,000, are Harvard Professor Vincent Brown and British historian William Dalrymple.