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SPAIN to the AMERICAS, to 1600 (3 of 6)

Inca and Hispanic Walls.
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Spain's monarchy took seriously its power in the Americas, and they were concerned about competition from the monarchies of England and France. In 1526 another Spaniard, Lucas Vásques de Ayllón, tried to establish a colony in what today is South Carolina, a colony that failed.

Another expansion took place in 1529 when Spanish soldiers, looking for fame and wealth, pushed from Mexico City northwest to what they called Nueva Galacia. They pillaged, burned villages and enslaved people who got in their way. Wanting slaves and needing an excuse for slave taking, they goaded friendly Indians into rebellion. And in 1531 they established the town of Guadalajara, named after their leader's birthplace in Spain.

Conquest in Mexico encouraged the Spaniards to move into South America. In some villages in the great Inca Empire in South America, small pox was wiping out from fifty to ninety percent of the population. The Inca Empire became more vulnerable following the death of the Inca, Huayna Capac (Cápac), in 1527. The empire was divided between his two sons, and a quarrel between the two erupted and led to civil war. Then a measles epidemic began in both Mexico and Inca territory.

The brother who won the civil war was Atahuallpa. Atahuallpa held his brother prisoner and was consolidating his victory by warring against members of the royal family and some nobles who had sided with his brother, when, in 1532, a Spaniard in his mid-fifties, Francisco Pizarro, arrived in Inca territory with 102 men, 62 horses and some interpreters.

Atahuallpa had been warned of Pizarro's arrival. He knew of the Spanish and their horses and was unafraid of a force of 102 men. Atahuallpa agreed to meet Pizarro at the central plaza of Cajamarca, a town in the northern half of the empire. Atahuallpa was accompanied by five to six thousand armed men, and his army of around 35,000 was nearby. He arrived carried aloft in a chair on the shoulders of his servants. Pizarro's chaplain greeted the king with the announcement that King Charles V of Spain was the only true king and that the Christian god was the only true god. Atahuallpa was handed a copy of the Christian Bible. The Inca king was not about to take instruction, believing as the Inca did that their gods had put them on the world to teach others and that their great god of the sky, Virechocha, controlled all things. Atahuallpa looked at the Bible and threw it to the ground. A prearranged signal by the Spanish was given and Spaniards who had been hiding from the view of the Incas fired their harquebusiers (predecessor of the musket) and two light cannon into the Inca crowd, the weapons giving the Spanish the advantage of range and shock. Then Pizarro's cavalry charged. The Inca around Atahuallpa ran, and their panic frightened others farther back. The sight of men running and afraid frightened Atahuallpa's main force, and they also ran.

A few Spaniards were superficially wounded, while at least 1,500 Inca were killed. Pizarro took Atahuallpa prisoner, and for months he used him as a hostage and pawn with which to govern, while Atahuallpa's generals feared that attacking the Spaniards would leave their king dead.

Atahuallpa offered Pizarro gold and silver in exchange for his freedom, believing that with this Pizarro and his men would go away. Pizarro agreed, and Atahuallpa ordered agents to collect the treasure, mainly from areas that had supported his brother. Pizarro and his men received their treasure: 13,420 pounds of 22 carat-gold and 26,000 pounds of pure silver. Spaniard reinforcements arrived -- 150 in number. Atahuallpa was accused of organizing an attack against the Spanish. He was charged with treason, plotting the murder of his brother, worshipping false gods and polygamy. Condemned to be burned at the stake, he was told that if he accepted Christianity he would only be strangled to death. Atahuallpa converted, submitted stoically, was strangled in the Plaza of Cajamarca and given a Christian burial.

Pizarro accepted another son of Huayna Capac as his puppet king of the Inca, and obedience to the god-king helped Pizarro continue his rule, while people in some outlying areas of the empire remained hostile. Meanwhile, Spanish soldiers and colonists were flocking to South America in great number.

Pizarro's puppet king died within the year, and he was replaced by another brother, Manco Inca. Pizarro fought rebellions against his rule, and he had as allies some who had been dominated by the Inca, and those who had been dominated by the Inca were at least passive toward the Spanish. Helping in this passivity was the continuing belief among local peoples that the Spaniards were agents of the gods, fulfilling a prophecy about times of trouble.

Pizarro conquered the Inca capital, Cuzco. Remnants of Atahuallpa's once proud army fled north to Quito. Then in 1536, Manco Inca betrayed Pizarro and led a rebellion. He and his followers were driven into the mountains, where an Inca rule-in-exile would remain hidden for generations. Pizarro took revenge on Manco Inca. He had Manco Inca's wife stripped, beaten, shot with arrows and her body floated down the Yucay River for Manco Inca's forces to find.

Pizarro defeated a Spaniard's attempt to grab power away from him. But Pizarro had not had much time to enjoy his power and share of the new wealth. In 1551, while in his mid-sixties, followers of his defeated enemy took revenge and assassinated him. Inca meanwhile were being wiped out by the arrival of more disease -- an epidemic of what might have been typhus had arrived in 1545. Then from Europe came a virulent form of influenza. Diseases had been moving faster than did the Spaniards, carried by the Indians themselves into areas ahead of the Spanish.