Contrasted history of conquest in Peru – Milenio.com

As the story is usually told from the point of view of the victors, the Quai Branly Museum in Paris has decided to revisit the conquest of Peru through the artistic and historical dialogue of two emblematic figures: the conquistador Francisco Pizarro and the sovereign Inca Atahualpa.

“The aphorism is particularly right in the case of the conquest of Peru. The ‘real’ story of the Conquest there and rebuilt in every attempt to rereading” says Paz Nuñez-Regueiro , curator of the exhibition The Inca and conquistador .

The exhibition will be open until September 20, biographies of Inca weaves and conqueror through 120 Columbian and Hispanic works as Castilian books of the time, metalwork, tapestries, ceramics and weapons of time.

The key date of the meeting between Spanish and Inca was the November 16, 1532, the day on which Pizarro met Atahualpa in Cajamarca, whose name in Quechua means “people of thorns”.

Until the great city of the northern highlands of Peru Pizarro had arrived. Extremadura of humble origin who had risen in the military ranks of the Spain of Carlos V, sailed to America in Seville in 1502, and joined expeditions of other conquerors, as Alonso de Ojeda and Vasco Nunez de Balboa.

Launched to the final conquest of Peru in January 1531. Starting on foot from the north, the Spaniards were gaining meters as Inca despatched ambassadors entertained them with fruit, flames, textiles, gold, silver, women and servants and conquerors who considered spies, summarizing the organizers of the exhibition.

Atahualpa, meanwhile, had been imposed as Inca ruler in a bloody civil war in the absence of heir to the empire, and alderman exercised and central religious figure.

Finally, the conqueror quoted Atahualpa in Cajamarca, an important Inca city two thousand 700 meters. Following the example of Hernán Cortés in Mexico, Pizarro was waiting in ambush to capture him, but this was accompanied by thousands of men and with intent to talk.

It was the Dominican priest Vicente Valverde who went to meet Atahualpa to ask him to submit to the king of Spain and the Christian faith, according to the Spanish version which recovers the Quai Branly Museum.

Exasperated, the Inca sovereign threw down the Bible bearing the monk, while the Inca version holds that it was the Spanish who offended the natives to reject the drink were offered.

The fact is that the offense involved a “legitimate reason” for Pizarro launched its attack, Atahualpa would capture and forced the Indians to retreat. All this with only 168 men under his command. The trap of Cajamarca, as we know, led to the capture for eight months Atahualpa, requiring tons of gold and silver for his release and (this condition is met and missing the Spanish aa commitment) finally implementing the Inca demigod. bogus=”1″