Hello, and welcome to Western Sieve. Episode two hundred and forty seven,
Francisco Pisaro. This is one of those episodes where the title basically speaks for
itself. We need to introduce the man who will kind of go on to
conquer the powerful Inca Empire. Now I say kind of because I need to
give a major caveat with this story arc. We can say almost without qualification,
that Heronon Cortes conquered the Mexica slash Aztecs. Cortez was there from the
beginning of the conquest until the fall of Tenoshti Klan. That is not necessarily
the case when it comes to Pizzaro, As we're going to find out,
it would probably be more correct to say that the Pisaro's plural conquered the Inca
rather than Francisco Pizaro. As we're going to find out this conquest it's very
much a Pisarto family affair. Francisco has brothers who are going to be just
as if not more involved than he is in the conquest to come. So
that gets us to what we need to know for our intro today. Well,
before we get into the story, one quick ask I don't always talk
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you're listening, because that does help people find the show as well. Francisco
Pizarro was shaped by the region he grew up in. It's called Extremadura in
western Spain. For the record, for those of you familiar with a topography
of Spain today, Exta is now the modern providences of Badajos and Carcedes,
and it's still the poorest region of Spain today. But it would be of
course wrong for me to speak of Spain at this point, let alone provinces.
Pisaro would have considered himself a citizen of Steel Castile, and Aragon still
wouldn't formerly be merged and wouldn't really become a country until after Pisaro's death.
For ease, in some of these episodes, I want to make it clear
I'm going to refer to Spain and will today for the balance really of this
episode. But know that I do that so that you, as the listeners,
can more easily understand the story today, not because that is what Pizarro
would have thought. Now. Extra Medura was arid and unsuitable for just about
anything that made money. In the fifteenth century, the region was known for
producing good mercenaries, or at least lots of mercenaries. That's about it.
It would also, by the way, turn out that Dura was very good
at producing explorers and conquistadors. A shocking number of major conquistadors in Spanish explorers
come from Extra Madura, including of course, the Pisardo Clan, Vasco de
Nunez de Balboa, Hance de Leon, and Hernando de Soto were all from
this one region of Spain. Pizzaro was born in fourteen seventy eight. He
was therefore fifteen years old when Columbus returned from his first voyage. Like everyone
at that time in Spain, Pizzaro would have listened in wrapped fascination to the
story of Columbus's voyage and dreamed about what a new world might mean for him.
And I do mean listened to the story. I will remind you of
this throughout these episodes, but Pizzaro remained illiterate throughout his entire life. Columbus's
open letter describing his voyage hit Europe like a thunderbolt. The following letter was
written to the King and Queen of Castillan Aragon, Ferdinand and Isabella, but
it was essentially openly published to Europeans and widely read throughout the continent. Columbus
wrote quote, I found very many islands, filled with innumerable people, and
I have taken possession of them for their highnesses, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella,
done by proclamation and with the royal standard unfurled, and no opposition was
offered to me. People of this island today Haitian Dominican Republic, and of
all other islands I have found, and of which I have gotten information,
they all go naked, men and women as well as their mothers bore them.
They refuse nothing that they possess if it be asked of them. On
the contrary, they invite anyone to share in it, and play as much
love as if it would give their hearts. They are content with whatever trifle
of whatever kind may be given to them, whether it be of value or
value less. Their highnesses can see that I will give the King and Queen
as much gold as they may need. I will give them spices in cotton
and aloe, and slaves as many as they shall order. I also believe
I have found rhubarb in cinnamon, and I shall found a thousand other things
of value. And thus the Eternal God, our Lord, gives to all
those who walk in his way triumph over things that appear to be impossible.
And this was notably one with so many solemn prayers for the great exultation which
they shall have in the turning of so many peoples to our holy faith,
and afterwards for the temporal benefits, because not only Spain, but all Christendom
will have hence comfort and prophets done. Written in the caravan Nina off the
Canary Islands in the fifteenth day of February in the year one, four hundred
and ninety three, signed the Admiral now to a young man growing up in
Extremadura. The promises of that letter things like as much gold as they may
need. I mean, I can only imagine how that would have fired up
the imagination of one teenaged Francisco Pizarro. And there just weren't a lot of
opportunities for him. By the end of the fifteenth century, the class system
in the Kingdom of Spain had been for centuries in place, and for centuries
a rigid one. Those at the top, and I'm talking about, you
know, your aristocracy here, your dukes, your lords, so on and
so forth. These guys own asked estates, worked by peasants. They enjoyed
all the privileges and social prestige of the late fifteenth century Spanish kingdoms. And
I do mean legally too at this point, because Spain, even as it
transitions out of a feudal system, codifies in very legal ways this class division.
Those at the bottom, the peasants, the artisans. Generally speaking,
everyone who did manual labor usually remained in the same class to which they were
born. In the kingdoms of Spain, as elsewhere in Europe, there was
little upwards social mobility. If you were born poor, illiterate, and had
no family pedigree, then frankly, that is how you were going to die.
You could read that as plainly as if you could read Columbus's letter.
There were really only two ways for someone in the lower class to gain admittance
to the elite. Either marriage to member of the elite, which was unbelievably
rare, or you could distinguish yourself in a successful military campaign. Almost certainly,
like heronon Quartez before him, Pizzaro thought where would be best for him
to make his fortune. The wars in Italy were not ending anytime soon.
He could go there. Many young men from that part of Spain did,
But just like Cortez, Francisco Pizaro decided that he would roll the dice on
the New World. Thus, in the year fifteen o two, the landless,
titleless, impoverished, Francisco Pizaro boarded a ship bound for the West Indies.
This was one of the voyages of Columbus and was to date the largest
fleet ever to set sail to the land presently called the West Indies. It
carried two thousand, five hundred men, as well as horses, pigs,
and other animals. The procession that greeted the fleet in Hispaniola was overjoyed,
telling the men, you have arrived at a good moment, for there is
to be a war against the Indians, and we will be able to take
many slaves end quote. Whether Pizarro participated in this war against the local natives,
we do not now, but by fifteen oh nine he had become a
lieutenant in the local militia, and at some point we know that Pizzaro left
for an expedition to what is today Central America. By fifteen thirteen, at
the age of thirty five, he was second in command of an expedition led
by Vasco Nunez de Balboa the first year of in to set his foot in
the Pacific. At the time, neither Balboa nor Pisaro gave a darn about
the Pacific Ocean. However, they were just trying to find gold. They
didn't by the way they trudged their way up and down the mosquito infested jungles
of what is today Panama, they ever found any gold. Six years later,
in January fifteen nineteen, Balboa was arrested and executed. The order to
do so came from Spain. Of the man who carried it out was Pisardo.
By fifteen twenty one, Pissaro was one of the largest landowners in all
of Panama. He was also forty four years old. He had just received
the n Encomienda, essentially a plantation that came with one hundred and fifty native
servants. But to the north in Mexico and nan Cortez had conquered an entire
empire, and he had done it all before the age of thirty four.
Now, one thing that I will probably mention over and over again is that
Pizzaro is a lot older in comparison to other conquistadors. By the time he
actually carries out his conquering, and for not the last time, I'm going
to mention he was nearly a generation older than some other conquistadors. By the
time he finally got rid of Atahualpa and took control of Cusco in modern day
Peru, Pizzaro was restless. He wanted more. The age of thirty five
to forty five was considered the prime of a man's life at that time in
Spain. He wanted to make something happen right now, But the reality remained.
Pizzaro was ten years older than Cortez had been when Martz began his conquests,
and Pisaro had his work cut out for him, especially because the New
World seemed to be running out of empires. There did not seem to be
anything north of Mexico worth looking into, so the only logical direction to go
was south. By fifteen twenty four, three years after Cortes's conquest, Pizarro
had formed a company with two partners, Diego de al Margo, a fellow
extremo, and a local financier named Hanano de Luque. We won't talk about
him very much. The three men were following an economic model that had originated
in Europe and was now spreading throughout the Spanish colonies in the Caribbean the private
corporation. By the early sixteenth century, Spain had gradually transformed from the age
of feudalism to the age of capitalism. Under feudalism, all economic activities centered
upon the manorial estate owned by a lord who had been given his land grant
or fee for benefice by a king, to whom the lord owed his allegiance.
Other than the lord and his family may be a parish priest and perhaps
a few administrative officials. The entire population of a feudal estate consisted of serfs.
These people, who worked on the land, by and large could not
leave the land, and created surplus agricultural produce for the lord and his family.
It was a system as rigid as it was simple. The lord and
his family did no manual labor, living at the peak of the social pyramid,
while the peasant masses scratched out a patence living below. Eventually, however,
mostly thanks to gunpowder, lord's castle walls were no longer the impregnable fortress
that they were in the fourteen hundreds. Bus they could no longer offer protection
to their retinue of serfs. Gradually, these serfs migrated to towns and cities
were commerce and the idea of working for a profit had begun to flourish.
Men now often joined forces, hooling their resources, setting up companies, and
hiring workers who were made a wage. All profits now flowed to the owners
or capitalists, as they were called, and anyone with the requisite skills and
the right connections could become an entrepreneur. The acquisition of wealth had now become
a motive in and of itself in sixteenth century Spain. Therefore, if an
individual could scrap together a substantial pile of wealth, he could use it to
purchase what was now the equivalent of that manorial estate. The individual could then
retire to a life of luxury and pass his capital into his heirs. This
was a universally new world order. There is a popular myth that I want
to dispel, the myth that the conquistadors were sent forth by the Spanish king
in order to expand an emerging Spanish empire, and that these were professional soldiers
who were all financed by the king. Nothing could be further from the truth,
ladies and gentlemen, Nothing in reality and we saw this with cortels.
The Spaniards who bought passages on the ship's headed for the New World were just
a representative sample of the people back home. There were cobblers, Taylor's notaries,
carpenters, sailors, merchants, ironworkers, blacksmiths, blah blah blah blah
blah blah, even professional musicians. Very few of these men had ever been
professional soldiers. In fact, that would be hard because permanent professional armies hadn't
even really appeared yet in Europe, and if you wanted to be a professional
soldier, the place to be was northern Italy, not the New World.
The vast majority of Spaniards traveled to the New World not because they were told
to do so by the king, not because they were employees of the king,
but as private citizens hoping to acquire the wealth and status that eluded them
at home. Men joined these expeditions and be blunt here in the hopes of
getting rich, period full stop. And what that means is they hope to
find a large population of natives in order to strip them of their wealth and
live off their labor. This was not a nice system, and I don't
think any historian has ever said that it was each band of unquistadors, usually
led by an older kunquistador who had the most experience, was composed of a
disparate group of men trained in all kinds of professions. None would get a
payment or a wage for participating. The idea was that if you participated,
you got a share in the profits gained by the conquest of the pillage,
according to whatever you had invested in the expedition. That's going to be important.
By the ways we're going to see in this story, if you show
up too late to the party, you don't get a share in the spoils.
Now, if the same man provides things of use, like a horse,
of course you're going to get a much larger share. But that's not
necessarily the rank and file. The leaders of most conquest expeditions, beginning in
the fifteen twenties formed a company that was normally drawn up as a contract and
notarized. This wasn't a group of feudal knights saying oaths of loyalty in riding
off into the sunset. This was a corporation. The participants thus became partners
in the company and were the equivalent of shareholders, unlike companies dedicated to providing
services or manufactured goods. However, it was understood from the outset that the
conquest company's economic plan was predicated upon and again I'm going to be blunt,
murder, torture, and plunder. Conquistadors were never paid soldiers, never emissaries
of some distant Spanish king. Charles the Fifth didn't have the money to pay
anybody. He got a fifth share of the profits for doing nothing, and
he liked it that way. When you these were autonomous participants in a new
kind of capitalist adventure. In short, to be honest with you, they're
little more than armed entrepreneurs. By fifteen twenty four, then forty six year
old Pissaro and his two partners had formed a conquest company called the Company of
the Levant. Remember, these conquistadors still believed they were doing God's work in
all of us. The two captains of the enterprise, Pisaro and Almalgo,
had participated in expeditions together since at least fifteen nineteen. This was an incredible
amount of experience for the times. Cortez had virtually no hands on experience when
he set out to conquer Mexico. By his standard, Pizarro would be considered
a grizzled veteran. Even Almargo had been in the New World for over a
decade, though his conquistadoring experience was decidedly less than Pizzaro. But Almargo was
a genius organizer. His job was to provision the upcoming expedition. As one
Spanish chronicler put at, Almargo was quote a man of short stature, with
ugly features, but with great courage and endurance. He was generous, but
was conceited and given to boasting, letting his tongue run sometimes without a stop.
He was sensible, and above all was greatly a fate of offending the
king. Ignoring the opinions that others may have of him, I the chronicler
will only say that he was born of such humble parentage that one could say
that his lineage began and ended with himself end quote. That is to say,
like Pisaro, Margo was illiterate and a bastard. Now, for a
number of years, the Europeans in the New World that held rumors this fabled
golden land to the south, somewhere south of Panama City. So the legend
went there was an empire so wealthy it put Mexico to shame. In the
early correspondence, this land is referred to his Vu with a V or Bu
with a B, which is how the modern day country gets its name Peru.
Pizzarro and al Marrico decided to have a crack at finding this land in
fifteen twenty four, but after a year they turned around having found nothing.
I know, this is so hard for us to understand day because we look
at a map and it's just so obvious where South America is. But we
need to remember that these Europeans at least had no clue how large South America
was. And I mean it's to put it by comparison. Heck, even
an eighteen hundred Europeans and then Americans still hope that there was a water route
from the east to the west coast of North America. And there wasn't and
Pizzaro is operating almost three hundred years earlier. But the two men refused to
be deterred. In fifteen twenty six, Pizzaro and Almagro set out on another
expedition. This one would last two years until fifteen twenty eight. This was
a larger expedition with one hundred and sixty men. This time, Pizzaro and
Almagro sensed they might be onto something soon. Off the coast of wood Is,
Ecuador today, the crew was surprised to see a sail in the distance.
They'd never seen anything like this in the Caribbean. As the Spaniards drew
nearer, they were astonished to find a giant, ocean going balsa wood raft,
powered by finely woven cotton sails and manned by numerous native soilers. Eleven
of the twenty two natives on board immediately leapt into the sea. The Spaniards
captured the rest after seizing the contents of the mysterious vessel. The delighted entrepreneurs
later described their first hall of booty in a letter that they sent back to
King Charles. Quote they the Inca were carrying many pieces of silver and gold
as personal ornaments, and also crowns and dietems, belts, bracelets, leg
armor and breastplates, tweaselers, rattlers, strings and clusters of beads, rubies,
mirrors, adoined with silver, and cups and other drinking vessels. They
were carrying many woolen cotton mantles and other pieces of clothing, all richly made
and colored with scarlet, crimson, blue, yellow, and all other colors,
and worked with different types of ornate embroidery, including figures of birds,
animals, and fish and trees. They had some tiny weights to weigh gold
the Roman manner, and there were bead bags full of some small stones of
emeralds and other jewels and pieces of crystal. They were taking all of this
to trade for fish shells from which they make counters coral colored and white.
They were carrying almost a full shipload of these. End quote, this seagoing
raft was Pisado's real first piece of proof that somewhere nearby a native kingdom had
to exist, and it had to be sophisticated. This was a way more
sophisticated ocean going vessel than anything the Spanish had encountered in the Caribbean. Unfortunately,
as Pisardo continued, the ship's stores dwindled and the Spaniards begin to get
sick. Then one by one they started to die. By the time the
three or four Spaniards were dying a week, their morale hit a low point.
Not surprisingly, the men wanted to go back to Panama. Pisaro,
however, the sort of co ceo of an expedition that had just found evidence
of a possible wealthy kingdom, refused to be deterred. By now he was
nearly fifty years old. It had taken Pisaro a quarter of a century to
command an expedition for which he stood to gain the lion share of the profits.
As many later chroniclers noted, Pizzaro normally did very little talking, but
he was strong when it came to action. But when sufficiently motivated, Pizzaro
could be counted upon to deliver quite the motivational speech. Thus, when the
relief ships finally did arrive and his men made ready to abandon the expedition and
returned to Panama, Pizarro was said to have taken out his sword and frustration,
and he etched a line in the sand or I'm literally a line in
the sand with a sharpened point, And then he dramatically confronted the men,
saying, quote, gentlemen, this line signifies labor, hunger, thirst,
fatigue, wounds, sickness, and every other kind of danger that must be
encountered in this conquest until life is ended. Let those who have the courage
to meet and overcome the dangers of this heroic achievement, cross the line in
token of their resolution and as a testimony that they will be by faithful companions,
And let those who feel unworthy of such daring return to Panama. For
I do not wish to use my force upon any man. I trust in
God that for his greater honor and glory, his eternal majesty will help those
who remain with me, though they be few, and that we shall not
feel the want of those who forsake us. End quote. Ultimately, only
thirteen men crossed over the line. The rest of the Spaniards decided to return
to Panama. So I guess it wasn't that good of a speech. Where
their remaining ship of Pizarto and his tiny group of volunteers continued down the coast
into territory that no other European had hitherto explored. Slowly, as the Spaniards
sailed south, the forest of mosquitoes began to retreat, until at the very
northern tip of what is today Peru, they finally sailed into view of what
Pizzarto had been searching for and dreaming about for years. A native city,
complete with more than a thousand buildings, broad streets, and what looked to
be ships in the harbor. The year was fifteen twenty eight, and this
was the Empire of the Inca. And for the small band of bedraggled Spaniards
who had been traveling for more than a year and many of whom were as
gone to skeleton, they were about to have their first real contact with the
Inca. As the Spanish moored off shore, they soon saw a dozen balsa
rafts set out from the shore. Pizzaro knew that because his men were few
in numbers, he couldn't possibly try to conquer such a large city. Instead,
he would have to rely on diplomacy in order to learn more about who
these people were, what they had just stumbled upon. As the native rafts
drew nearer, the Spaniards buckled on their armor and readied their swords for battle.
Were the natives going to be hostile or were they be friendly? Were
there more cities? Did they have gold? Was this a simple city state
or part of a larger kingdom. One can only imagine Pisardo and the other
Spaniards relief to discover that not only were the natives friendly, but they arrived
with gifts of food that included a particular type of they thought lamb was actually
Yama meat, exotic fruits, fish, jugs of water, and chica,
which the Spaniards would sern lun is, a type of beer. One of
the natives who climbed on board the ship was a man who obviously was in
command. The native was well dressed in a patterned cotton tunic and had elongated
ear lobes with large wooden plugs in them, something that none of the other
natives wore. Unable to communicate apart from basic hand gestures, this Inca official,
that's what he was, nonetheless astonished the Spanish with his ability to communicate.
Pizarro, in truth, just wanted to know if there was gold,
but he was smart enough not to reveal that. He worked to conceal the
true purpose of his mission while simultaneously trying to learn as much as he could
about the land and its people. Pissaro presented the Inca official with a few
gifts, including two pigs. He ordered two of his men to accompany the
official back to the shore. The Inca inhabitants of the town turned out to
marvel at the two exotic visitors, one of whom was an African slave.
They quote all came out to see the saw and the boar, and the
hens, delighting and hearing the rooster crow. But all that was nothing compared
to the commotion created by the black man. Because they saw that he was
black. They looked him over and over again and made him wash to see
if his blackness was color or some kind of applied confection. But he laughed,
showing his white teeth. As some came to see him, and then
others, so many that they did not even give him time to eat.
He walked here and there and wherever they went to see him as something so
new and by them they had never seen before. End quote. And as
to the Spaniard quote, they looked at how the Spaniard Melina had a beard
that was white. They asked him many things, but he understood nothing.
The children, the old, and the women all looked at them delightedly.
The Spaniards saw many buildings and remarked on many things. Irrigation channels, many
planted fields, fruit, and some sheep actually yamas. Many Indian women very
beautiful and well attired and dressed according to their customs came to talk to him.
They all gave him fruits and whatever they had in order for him to
take them to the ship. They used gestures to ask where the Spaniards were
going and where they had come from. Among those Indian women who were talking
to him was a very beautiful lady, and she told him to stay with
them, and that they would give one of them to him as a wife,
whichever one he wanted. And when he the Spaniard, arrived back at
the ship, he was so overwhelmed by what he had seen that he didn't
say anything. He finally said that their houses were of stone, and before
he spoke to the lord, the local in a governor, he passed through
three gates where they had gatekeepers that they served him in cups of silver and
gold. Subsequently, Pizarro sent a landing party to verify what the two had
to say. They quote saw silver vessels and many silversmiths working, and that
on some walls the temple there were gold and silver sheets, and that the
women were called the Sun were very beautiful. The Spaniards were ecstatic to hear
so many things, hoping with God's help to enjoy their share of it.
Duote. With their ships laden down with fresh food, Pizarro and his men
continued down the coast. Pizarro himself did go to the shore in a canoe.
At one point. According to a source, he said, quote by
my witness, I take possession of this land with all else that has been
discovered by us, for the Emperor, our lord, and for the Royal
Crown of cass Steele end quote. Pursue into the laws of everyone in South
America had just become subjects of the King of Castile. Sadly they did not
know that yet. They would find out in due chorus. But when they
did they would be running from Spanish horses and dying from European diseases. Pizzaro's
expedition, from his perspective, had been a complete success. On board their
ship they now carried a never poor scene alpaca and two native boys, all
at all not a bad first haul. The records do record they baptized the
boys for a good measure. No word as to the alpaca, But Pizarro
could hardly rest easy as his ship returned to Panama. He now faced the
same issue Cortez faced in Mexico. He needed a legal right to conquer this
untouched empire. If he did not get it, then some other Spaniard would
just come along and scoop it up. It was crucial that the King and
Queen signed off on his right to conquer the Inca. Granted, he didn't
really know who the Inca were or have any sense as to wear their empire
stretched, but he needed the right to conquer them all the same, and
the present King, Charles the Fifth of Spain knew king since Bizarro left home,
didn't really care where the Incan empire was either. He only cared if
they had gold, and so no sooner had Pizarro returned to Panama than he
booked passage to Spain, a kingdom he had not seen in thirty years.
Pizardo reached Seville in fifteen twenty eight, more than a dozen years after Queen
Isabella and then King Ferdinand, the two monarchs who had sponsored the initial voyage
he left on, had died. Their twenty eight year old grandson, Charles
the Fifth, now ruled Spain. It had been nearly three decades since the
impoverished Pisaro left home. He had come back a significantly richer man. He
also came back as one of the most experienced conquistadors in the New World,
Pizzaro hoped to leverage his discovery of this new and wealthy land. He called
Peru into the legal right to conquer and rule the same in the name of
the king. But he quickly found out that he was far from the man
of the hour. The forty three year old Heronon Cortes had also returned,
and he had returned with heaps of treasure that would have impressed Alexander the Great.
Pizaro had words and promises. Cortes had gold. I think you can
guess who got more attention from the royal officials. There was much Pizzaro,
though, could learn from Cortes. The bottom line was that Charles the Fifth
rule the vast domain, but he was perennially in need of cash. Purchasing
the Holy Roman Imperial crown had cost him a veritable fortune. He needed the
New World to pay for it. What Pizzaro quickly realized was that gold could
buy forgiveness. Cortes's spectacular display had had its desired effect. Although Cortes had
risked conquering the Aztecs slash Mexica with no official permission. King Charles brushed that
aside and marveled at everything he was shown, honoring the great conqueror by having
Cortes sit beside him. The King then anointed Cortes with the title of Marquis,
named him the Captain General of Mexico, granted him a state of twenty
three thousand Mexico vassals, and also granted him eight percent of all future prophets
derived from his conquests and one stroke of the royal pen. Cortez officially became
one of the richest men in Europe, as well as one of the most
famous. Now, after having secured royal patronage, Cortez and his conquest would
be safe from the predations of other Spaniards. With the visit of Cortes fresh
in his mind, King Charles gave Pisaro a friendly reception when he came.
Although it had taken him thirty years, Pisaro had clearly moved up in the
world. For now, the former peasant from Extremadura was having an audience with
one of the most powerful rulers in Europe. Charles the Fifth, was not
only the monarch of the kingdoms of Spain, but the ruler of Netherlands,
parts of what are now Austria and Germany, the kingdoms of the Two Sicilies,
an assortment of islands in the Caribbean, the Isthmus of Panama, and
thanks to Cortez Mexico. Before the king and his courts, Pisaro brought out
the Yamas, the native clothing, vessels, pottery, and other goods,
and then described when he and his men had seen recently in this explored part
of the world. He talked about the well ordered city he had seen,
its buildings, inhabitants, intricately cut stones, and especially the interior walls lined
with gleaming sheets of gold. The normale quiet conquistador apparently made a very good
sales pitch this time, because in July of fifteen twenty nine, while the
king was on his way to his coronation, Queen Isabella this is a different
Queen Isabella. Remember you think back to the Charles episodes. This is Isabella
of Portugal, now married Charles the fifth. Anyway, she signed a contract
stating as follows quote the exclusive right to conquer the unexplored land of Peru as
for you, Captain Francisco Pizarro. Because of the desire that you have to
serve us. You would like to continue the said conquest and settlement at your
own cost and upkeep, so that we are at no time obliged to pay
you or satisfy the expenses you might have in it, except what was granted
to you in this agreement. First, I give permission and authority to you.
That's Bizarro that for us, in our name and in that of the
Royal Crown of Castile, you may continue the said discovery and conquest and settlement
of the Province of Peru up to two hundred leagues about seven hundred miles of
land along the same coast. And understanding that you are the executor in the
service of God, our Lord and ours, and to honor your person and
to benefit you and grant you favor, we promise to make you our governor
and Captain general of all the Province of Peru, land and villages that are
present and will later be within the entire two leagues for all days of your
life, but the salary of seven hundred and twenty five thousand manavidis each year
counted from the day that you set sail from these are kingdoms. To continue
the said settlement and conquest. This should be paid to you from the income
and interest belonging to us in the said land that you would thus settle.
Further, we grant you the title of our governor of said Province of Peru,
as well as the office of Marshal of the same. All this for
the rest of the days of your life. End quote. The terms of
the contract were about as good as Pizaro could have hoped for. However,
there remained one major obstacle. He was required to raise the funds for the
expedition on his own. He needed the normal kinds of provisions for any expedition,
ships, food, fodder, etc. Then Pizaro also needed everything one
needed to conquer a people swords, guns, knives, horses, crossbows,
and of course, finding men. This wasn't going to be cheap, but
Pizzaro knew he needed to keep the immediate costs down. His hope was to
be able to cover the cost of the expedition with the proceeds from set expedition.
That meant he would not be able to pay for that much upfront.
The men turned out to be the easy part, because Pizzaro knew just where
to look. Shortly after getting his contract, Pizzaro made straight for his hometown
of Trujillo, where he met with scores of impoverished young men, young men
who had been just like him, without hope. He offered them the promise
of gold and commend us in the New World, and they signed up in
droves, virtually, no questions asked interestingly. As a quick side note,
we also know that shortly after Pizaro got his contract he met with haren On
Cortez. We have no idea what the two men said to each other.
Did Cortes have advice for the new but older conquistador frankly given out? Pisaro
behaved once he got to Peru. I have to imagine he did. Pizaro
is essentially going to follow the Cortes blueprint, if we can call it that,
from the moment he arrives in the Inca Empire. I think it very
unlikely this all happened by pure chance, and so at last, in January
fifteen thirty, Pizzaro set sail from Seville. The second major war of Spanish
conquest in the New World was formerly underway. The Mexica had already fallen under
the weight of the guns, horses, and European disease. Now it was
the inca's turn to see how they might fare. But next, before we
begin said conquest, I want to take a moment and look at INCA history
in the decades immediately preceding Pisarto's arrival, because some very important events have transpired,