An Inca Account of the Conquest of Peru Read online

  An Inca Account of

  the Conquest of Peru

  by Titu Cusi Yupanqui

  An Inca Account of

  the Conquest of Peru

  by Titu Cusi Yupanqui

  TRANSLATED, INTRODUCED, AND ANNOTATED BY

  Ralph Bauer

  UNIVERSITY PRESS OF COLORADO

  © 2005 by the University Press of Colorado

  Published by the University Press of Colorado

  5589 Arapahoe Avenue, Suite 206C

  Boulder, Colorado 80303

  All rights reserved

  Printed in the United States of America

  The University Press of Colorado is a proud member of the Association of American University Presses.

  The University Press of Colorado is a cooperative publishing enterprise supported, in part, by Adams State College, Colorado State University, Fort Lewis College, Mesa State College, Metropolitan State College of Denver, University of Colorado, University of Northern Colorado, and Western State College of Colorado.

  The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials. ANSI Z39.48-1992

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Yupangui, Diego de Castro, titu cussi, 16th cent.

  [Relación de la conquista del Perú. English]

  An Inca account of the Conquest of Peru / by titu cusi Yupanqui ; translated,

  introduced, and annotated by Ralph Bauer.

  p. cm.

  Includes bibliographical references and index.

  ISBN 0-87081-807-4 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 0-87081-821-X (pbk. :

  alk. paper)

  1. Peru—History—Conquest, 1522–1548. 2. Peru—History—1548–1820. I.

  Bauer, Ralph. II. Title.

  F3442.Y85 2005

  985’.02—dc22

  2005006829

  Design by Daniel Pratt

  14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For Grace

  Contents

  List of Illustrations

  Acknowledgments

  Chronology

  Introduction

  Translation of Titu Cusi Yupanqui’s Account

  Bibliography

  Glossary of Quechua and Spanish Terms Appearing in the Text

  Index

  Illustrations

  1. Map of Tahuantinsuyu. From Moseley, The Incas and

  Their Ancestors

  2. Huascar Inca (the Twelfth Inca) is taken prisoner by

  Atahuallpa’s generals

  3. Atahuallpa meets Francisco Pizarro, the priest Vicente de

  Valverde, and the translator Felipillo. From Guaman Poma de

  Ayala, Nueva corónica y buen gobierno

  4. Atahuallpa is executed by the Spaniards. From Guaman

  Poma de Ayala, Nueva corónica y buen gobierno

  5. A quipucamayoc interpreting quipus. From Guaman Poma de

  Ayala, Nueva corónica y buen gobierno

  6. The newly reigning Manco Inca in his ceremonial throne

  in Cuzco. From Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva corónica y

  buen gobierno

  7. St. James the Great, Apostle of Christ, intervenes in the

  war for Cuzco. From Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva corónica

  y buen gobierno

  8. Frontispiece of Domingo Santo Tomás’s

  Lexicon o Vocabulario (1560)

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to thank the staff of the Real Biblioteca del Monasterio San Lorenzo del Escorial, particularly José Luis del Valle Merino and Teodoro Alonso Turienzo, for permitting me to inspect the original manuscript of Titu Cusi’s Instrucción and the staff of the Biblioteca del Palacio Real in Madrid, particularly Valentín Moreno and Pilar Uguiua, for their helpfulness in permitting me to produce a photocopy of the microfilm copy of the text. I also want to thank my colleague Regina Harrison for her patience and helpfulness in answering my questions. Thanks finally to K. Lane and the anonymous reader for University Press of Colorado for their invaluable comments, as well as to Darrin Pratt and Laura Furney for their patience and encouragement.

  Chronology

  ca. 1100

  Manco Capac founds Cuzco

  ca. 1438

  Birth of Inca Urco

  1438–1471

  Life of Inca Pachacuti

  1471–1493

  Life of Topa Inca

  1493

  Birth of Huayna Capac

  1521

  Hernando Cortés conquers México-Tenochtitlan

  1524

  Death of Huayna Capac; partition of empire between Huascar and Atahuallpa

  1530

  Francisco Pizarro enters Inca territory

  1532

  Atahuallpa’s victory over Huascar in civil war

  1533 (January)

  Pizarro captures Atahuallpa in Caxamarca

  1533 (July)

  Execution of Atahuallpa

  1533 (July–November)

  Coronation and death of Topa Huallpa

  1533 (December)

  Coronation of Manco Inca in Cuzco

  1535

  Francisco Pizarro founds Lima

  1536

  Siege of Cuzco by Manco Inca’s forces

  1537

  Removal to Vilcabamba

  1541 (July)

  Assassination of Francisco Pizarro by loyalists of Diego de Almagro

  1545

  Assassination of Manco Inca; succession of Saire Topa

  1546 (January)

  Gonzalo Pizarro rebels against authority of the crown and assassinates the first viceroy of Peru, Blasco Núñez Vela

  1551

  Antonio de Mendoza is appointed second viceroy of Peru

  1554

  Petition of Peruvian encomenderos for perpetuity of the encomienda

  1556

  The emperor Charles V steps down; his son Philip II is crowned emperor

  1556 (June)

  Andrés Hurtado de Mendoza, Marquis of Cañete, is appointed third viceroy of Peru

  1556 (October)

  Saire Topa accepts Spanish proposal to give up residency at Vilcabamba and remove to Cuzco

  1560

  Death of Saire Topa in Cuzco

  1560

  Coronation of Titu Cusi Yupanqui in Vilcabamba

  1561

  Arrival of the Count of Nieva as fourth viceroy of Peru

  1564

  The licenciate García de Castro arrives in Lima as president of audiencia

  1568

  Titu Cusi is baptized at Vilcabamba

  1569

  Arrival of fifth viceroy of Peru, Francisco de Toledo

  1570

  Fray Marcos García, Diego Ortiz, and Martín de Pando arrive at Vilcabamba; redaction of Titu Cusi’s account

  1571

  Death of Titu Cusi Yupanqui and succession of Topa Amaru

  1572

  Spanish invasion of Vilcabamba; execution of Topa Amaru on orders of viceroy Francisco de Toledo

  An Inca Account of the Conquest of Peru

  by Titu Cusi Yupanqui

  Introduction

  From Cajamarca to Vilcabamba

  The text presented here for the first time in full-length English translation is an account of the cataclysmic events that took place in the Andes during the sixteenth century.1 Its author, Diego de Castro Titu Cusi Yupanqui (1530?–1571), was the penultimate descendant of the Inca dynasty. His grandfather was Huayna Capac (b. 1493), who once ruled a vast empire that stretched from South America’s Pacific coastline eas
tward across the Andes into the Amazonian lowlands and from what is today southern Columbia southward into central Chile and Argentina—a distance roughly equal to that between New York and Los Angeles. Although the Incas had been a rather insignificant ethnic group who controlled little more than their ancestral homelands around Cuzco only a few generations before Huayna Capac’s succession, he had inherited the largest polity that the Americas had seen.2 His empire was called the Tahuantinsuyu (“the parts that in their fourness make up the whole”) because it was composed of four major geographical quarters—the Chinchaysuyu in the northwest, the Antisuyu in the northeast, the Cuntisuyu in the southwest, and the Collasuyu in the southeast (see Illustration 1). These vast territories included scores of other tributary ethnic groups and were connected by a road system whose major highways covered some 25,000 miles—a distance approximately equal to the circumference of the earth. Huayna Capac had just brought under his dominion the northern kingdom of Quito, where he reportedly planned to found a second capital city, when, in 1524, he was informed of the appearance of bearded white strangers, who claimed to have arrived “by the wind” on the northwestern coast of the empire.3 Soon after receiving this news, his army and court were struck by a violent disease that killed thousands, including Huayna Capac and his presumptive heir, Ninan Coyoche, probably in 1526. The epidemic that killed Huayna Capac and his heir was probably smallpox, which had been brought by the Spanish explorers and conquerors from Europe. It had rapidly spread around the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America, and down into South America, killing tens of thousands of Native Americans, who had no biological resistance.

  The bearded white strangers who were reported to have landed on the northwestern coast were a band of eighty Spaniards under the leadership of Francisco Pizarro (b. 1471), a hidalgo (petty gentleman) from Trujillo in Extremadura.4 He had come to the New World in 1509, participated in Vasco Núñez de Balboa’s expedition resulting in the European discovery of the Pacific Ocean in 1513, and subsequently established himself as a colonist living on Native labor in Panama. Inspired by the fabulous exploits of Hernando Cortés in the conquest of Mexico (1520), Pizarro had entered into partnership with another citizen of Panama, Diego de Almagro, and a priest by the name of Hernando de Luque in order to explore the South American coastline and search for his own Mexico. Although their first expedition ended in failure in 1524, they found many signs of a great civilization during their coastal exploration. More expeditions were mounted and in 1530 a band of approximately 160 Spaniards landed on the Ecuadorian coast under Pizarro’s command and made their push inland. The Spaniards, however, found the land in devastation—the result, as they learned from the Natives, of a tremendous civil war that had been ravaging the entire country.

  1. Map of Tahuantinsuyu. From Moseley, The Incas and Their Ancestors: The Archaeology of Peru (London: Thames & Hudson, 1991 and 2001), 24. Reprinted by kind permission of Michael Moseley and Thames & Hudson

  The civil war was the consequence of the untimely deaths of Huayna Capac and his heir, which had left the two eldest of his seven surviving sons fighting for succession to the Inca throne.5 Huascar was initially crowned by the Inca nobility of Cuzco and controlled the southern parts of Tahuantinsuyu. His succession was challenged, however, by his half-brother Atahuallpa, who controlled the northern territories surrounding Quito and had the loyalty of Huayna Capac’s most able generals and their armies. When Huascar rejected Atahuallpa’s proposals for a peaceful arrangement, a deadly struggle ensued between the northern and southern parts of the empire. Huascar initially appeared to have the upper hand, even capturing his half-brother. But Atahuallpa was able to make his escape, and soon the tide turned, partially because of Huascar’s unpopularity among his own officers. In a major battle outside Cuzco Atahuallpa’s general Quisquis defeated Huascar’s forces, took Huascar prisoner, captured the capital, and, on Atahuallpa’s orders, had the Inca nobility loyal to Huascar persecuted and murdered (see Illustration 2).

  It was in the immediate aftermath of these turbulent events that the Spaniards appeared on the scene in Peru and first met with the victorious Atahuallpa at the northern town of Cajamarca on 16 November 1532 (see Illustration 3). The Spaniards came to the meeting with a plan, well tried in the conquest of Mexico, of taking the enemy leader hostage and using him as a puppet to control his subjects and extort gold and silver. Atahuallpa, underestimating the small band of strangers, left behind the greater part of his army, at least forty thousand strong, and came to the meeting in the enclosed main square of Cajamarca accompanied by only a lightly armed contingent of five or six thousand men. There he was ambushed by the Spaniards, who wreaked havoc among the terrified Andean warriors with arquebuses, cannons, and cavalry. The Spaniards killed at least 1,500 Andeans on that infamous day and took Atahuallpa prisoner without suffering a single casualty.

  2. Huascar Inca (the Twelfth Inca) is taken prisoner by Atahuallpa’s generals. From Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva corónica y buen gobierno. By kind permission of the Royal Library at Copenhagen (GKS 2232 4to), which owns the original manuscript and has published the full facsimile and a transcription on-line at http://www.kb.dk/elib/mss/poma/index-en.htm

  Atahuallpa, now in captivity and fearful that Huascar might try to take advantage of the situation by aligning himself with the strangers, gave orders to have his brother murdered. After Huascar’s death, Atahuallpa attempted to ransom himself by paying the Spaniards an enormous treasure of precious objects, which the Spaniards melted down to more than eleven tons in gold and thirteen tons in silver. Atahuallpa, despite Spanish promises, was not released and ruled the country from his captivity for half a year before he was finally garroted by his captors in July 1533 (see Illustration 4).6

  With both warring contenders for the Inca royal tassel dead and the Spaniards greedy for more gold, the conquerors marched on Cuzco. En route they were engaged in several fierce battles by the warriors of Atahuallpa’s general Quisquis but received a friendly reception from Atahuallpa’s enemies, both among the Inca nobility of Cuzco and among other ethnic groups who had been loyal to Huascar in the civil war.7 As a result, the Spaniards succeeded in capturing the Inca capital on Saturday, 15 November 1533. Eager for a new puppet-Inca who would exercise control on their behalf, the Spaniards proclaimed Atahuallpa’s and Huascar’s younger brother Topa Huallpa as the successor to the crown. When Topa Huallpa suddenly died en route to Cuzco in December 1533, Francisco Pizarro crowned their brother Manco Inca, who had lived in Cuzco and had still been an adolescent during the Inca civil war between his two older half-brothers Atahuallpa and Huascar.

  3. Atahuallpa meets Francisco Pizarro, the priest Vicente de Valverde, and their translator Felipillo. From Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva corónica y buen gobierno. By kind permission of the Royal Library at Copenhagen (GKS 2232 4to)

  4. Atahuallpa is executed by the Spaniards. From Guaman Poma de Ayala, Nueva corónica y buen gobierno. By kind permission of the Royal Library at Copenhagen (GKS 2232 4to)

  Initially, Manco Inca collaborated with the Spaniards in the ongoing fight against Atahuallpa’s generals. As the Spaniards’ greed and treatment of Manco Inca became increasingly intolerable, however, the old divisions between the loyalists of Atahuallpa and Huascar gave way to a shared resentment of the Spanish invaders. In 1536 Manco Inca fled Cuzco in order to take command of an enormous army of 100,000 warriors who had gathered outside the capital, ready to throw off the Spanish yoke. Under Manco Inca’s command, the Native armies simultaneously besieged Cuzco and Lima, cutting off communications between the two Spanish strongholds.8 Although they brought the Spaniards to the brink of disaster, even killing one of the Pizarro brothers, Juan, in the process, the effort ultimately failed, and the rebellious Andeans withdrew to the tropical lowlands of Vitcos and Vilcabamba on the eastern slopes of the Andes the following year (1537). In this remote refuge, Manco Inca re-created a neo-Inca state that resisted all Spanish incursions for more than thirty years, waging
a guerrilla war on Spanish trade routes and towns as well as neighboring ethnic groups subjected to Spanish rule.9

  With Manco Inca defiant and out of their control, the Spaniards in Cuzco crowned another of Huayna Capac’s sons as their new puppet ruler—Paullu Topa (1518–1549), who had remained loyal to the Spaniards during the siege of Cuzco and continued to assist with their numerous attempts to quell the resistance of the neo-Inca state at Vilcabamba. Now, however, the Spaniards were falling out amongst each other. Whereas Pizarro’s men had become fabulously rich in the extortion of Atahuallpa’s ransom at Cajamarca, the men of Almagro’s party, who had not been in Cajamarca at that time, had received only small portions. This caused deep resentment between the pizarrista and almagrista factions and escalated into a fierce struggle from which Pizarro emerged victorious. In 1538 Almagro was executed by one of Pizarro’s brothers, Hernando, after having lost the decisive battle of Las Salinas outside Cuzco. Almagro’s death did not, however, end the hostilities between the two factions. In July 1541 Francisco Pizarro was assassinated by Almagro’s son, who proclaimed himself governor but was later condemned to death by the official governor sent by the Crown in order to settle the dispute. The chaos in Spanish-controlled Peru was further aggravated when the youngest of the Pizarros, Gonzalo, rebelled against the authority of the first viceroy sent by the Crown, Blasco Núñez Vela. Although the insurgent initially was victorious against the royalist army in the battle of Añaquito (1546), in which the viceroy Núñez Vela was killed, Gonzalo Pizarro was finally defeated and executed in 1548 by an army loyal to the Crown led by the new royal governor Pedro de la Gasca.10