The Inca Empire, officially known as the Realm of the Four Parts, was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America. The administrative, political, and military center of the empire was in the city of Cusco. The Inca civilization rose from the Peruvian highlands sometime in the early 13th century. The Spanish began the conquest of the Inca Empire in 1532 and by 1572, the last Inca state was fully conquered.
Cusco or Cuzco is a city in southeastern Peru near the Sacred Valley of the Andes mountain range and the Huatanay river. It is the capital of the Department of Cusco and of the Cusco Province. The city is the seventh most populous in Peru; in 2017, it had a population of 428,450. Its elevation is around 3,400 m (11,200 ft).
Quipu are recording devices fashioned from strings historically used by a number of cultures in the region of Andean South America.
The Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire, also known as the Conquest of Peru, was one of the most important campaigns in the Spanish colonization of the Americas. After years of preliminary exploration and military skirmishes, 168 Spanish soldiers under conquistador Francisco Pizarro, along with his brothers in arms and their indigenous allies, captured the Sapa Inca Atahualpa in the 1532 Battle of Cajamarca. It was the first step in a long campaign that took decades of fighting but ended in Spanish victory in 1572 and colonization of the region as the Viceroyalty of Peru. The conquest of the Inca Empire, led to spin-off campaigns into present-day Chile and Colombia, as well as expeditions to the Amazon Basin and surrounding rainforest.
Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, born Gómez Suárez de Figueroa and known as El Inca, was a chronicler and writer born in the Viceroyalty of Peru. Sailing to Spain at 21, he was educated informally there, where he lived and worked the rest of his life. The natural son of a Spanish conquistador and an Inca noblewoman born in the early years of the conquest, he is known primarily for his chronicles of Inca history, culture, and society. His work was widely read in Europe, influential and well received. It was the first literature by an author born in the Americas to enter the western canon.
A chasqui was a messenger of the Inca empire. Agile, highly trained and physically fit, they were in charge of carrying messages –in the form of quipus or oral information– and small packets. Along the Inca road system there were relay stations called chaskiwasi, placed at about 2.5 kilometres (1.6 mi) from each other, where the chasqui switched, exchanging their message(s) with the fresh messenger. The chasqui system could be able to deliver a message or a gift along a distance of up to 300 kilometres (190 mi) per day.
Felipe Guamán Poma de Ayala, also known as Huamán Poma or Waman Poma, was a Quechua nobleman known for chronicling and denouncing the ill treatment of the natives of the Andes by the Spanish Empire after their conquest of Peru. Today, Guaman Poma is noted for his illustrated chronicle, El primer nueva corónica y buen gobierno.
A panaca or panaqa, or panaka was a family clan of the Sapa Inca, the kuraka or emperor of the Inca Empire. The panacas were formed by the descendants of a Sapa Inca or his wife. The basic social institution of the Incas is the ayllu. An ayllu is a group of families that descended from a common ancestor, united by culture and religion, in addition to the agricultural work, livestock and fishing of the same territory. The ayllu concept transcended into nobility, so that the royal kinship could establish a lineage, called panaca or royal house.
Lloque Yupanqui was the third Sapa Inca of the Kingdom of Cuzco and a member of the Hurin dynasty.
Mayta Cápac was the fourth Sapa Inca of the Kingdom of Cuzco and a member of the Hurin dynasty.
The Incas were most notable for establishing the Inca Empire which was centered in modern-day South America in Peru and Chile. It was about 2,500 miles from the northern to southern tip. The Inca Empire lasted from 1438 to 1533. It was the largest Empire in America throughout the Pre-Columbian era. The Inca state was known as the Kingdom of Cuzco before 1438. Over the course of the Inca Empire, the Inca used conquest and peaceful assimilation to incorporate the territory of modern-day Peru, followed by a large portion of western South America, into their empire, centered on the Andean mountain range. However, shortly after the Inca Civil War, the last Sapa Inca (emperor) of the Inca Empire was captured and killed on the orders of the conquistador Francisco Pizarro, marking the beginning of Spanish rule. The remnants of the empire retreated to the remote jungles of Vilcabamba and established the small Neo-Inca State, which was conquered by the Spanish in 1572.
The Inca society was the society of the Inca civilization in Peru. The Inca Empire, which lasted from 1438 to 1533 A.D., represented the height of this civilization. The Inca state was known as the Kingdom of Cusco before 1438. Over the course of the empire, the rulers used conquest and peaceful assimilation to incorporate a large portion of western South America, centered on the Andes mountain ranges. The empire proved relatively short-lived however: by 1533, Atahualpa, the last Sapa Inca (emperor) of the Inca Empire, was killed on the orders of the conquistador Francisco Pizarro, marking the beginning of Spanish rule. The last Inca stronghold, the Neo-Inca State in Vilcabamba, was conquered by the Spanish in 1572.
The term Peruvian literature not only refers to literature produced in the independent Republic of Peru, but also to literature produced in the Viceroyalty of Peru during the country's colonial period, and to oral artistic forms created by diverse ethnic groups that existed in the area during the prehispanic period, such as the Quechua, the Aymara and the Chanka South American native groups.
Coricancha, Curicancha, Koricancha, Qoricancha or Qorikancha was the most important temple in the Inca Empire, and was described by early Spanish colonialists. It is located in Cusco, Peru, which was the capital of the empire.
Blas Valera (1544-1597) was a Roman Catholic priest of the Jesuit Order in Peru, a historian, and a linguist. The son of a Spaniard and an indigenous woman, he was one of the first mestizo priests in Peru. He wrote a history of Peru titled Historia Occidentalis which is mostly lost, although the Inca Garcilaso de la Vega quoted some of it in his General History of Peru. In 1583 Valera was jailed by the Jesuits. The Jesuits claimed they were punishing Valera for sexual misconduct but more likely the reason was heresy. Valera's writings claimed the Incas were the legitimate rulers of Peru, the Inca's language, Quechua, was equal to Latin as the language of religion, and the Inca religion had prepared the Andean peoples for Christianity. In 1596, still under house arrest, he traveled to Spain. He died there in 1597.
The Comentarios Reales de los Incas is a book written by Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, the first published mestizo writer of colonial Andean South America. The Comentarios Reales de los Incas is considered by most to be the unquestioned masterpiece of Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, born of the first generation after the Spanish conquest.
Aclla, also called Chosen Women, Virgins of the Sun, and Wives of the Inca, were sequestered women in the Inca Empire. They were virgins, chosen at about age 10. They performed several services. They were given in marriage to men who had distinguished themselves in service to the empire; they produced luxury items, weaving fine cloth, preparing ritual food, and brewing the chicha (beer) drunk at religious festivals; and some, the most "perfect," were selected as human sacrifices for religious rites. Others lived out their lives in a monastic environment.
Yanaca is a group of ancient, pre-Incan towns located in Peru in Apurimac Region, Aymaraes Province, Yanaca District. These towns were located in the area surrounding the present-day town of Yanaca in the Andes mountain range, between the Quechua and Suni regions.
The history of Cusco (Peru), the historical capital of the Incas.
Ñusta, which roughly translates to "princess" in the Quechua language, is a term for a highly noble or upper-class woman of Inca or Andean birth. Inca noblewomen were essentially part of the Inca Empire also called "Tawantinsuyu" where they spoke the traditional Inca spoken language "Quechua." Ñustas were not full descendants of Inca royalty. Therefore, the Quechua term was used to denote the regional origin of the ñusta's non-royal parent. A ñusta could range from being the daughter or half-sister of the Sapa Inca himself, one of his lesser wives, or a wife or daughter of another high-ranking male noble, such as the heads of the local municipalities, Kurakas. The Spaniards recognized ñustas as noblewomen and added the Spanish term “Doña” to their Christian and Andean names.
