Габриель де Овьедо. Сообщение о Посольстве Вице-короля в Вилькабамбу, 1571 год.
GABRIEL DE OVIEDO. A NARRATIVE OF THE VICE-ROYAL EMBASSY TO VILCABAMBA, 1571.
NOTICE.
AFTER the Society’s volume was issued in
1907 containing the History of the Incas
by Sarmiento, and the narrative of the execution
of the Inca Tupac Amaru by Ocampo, a manuscript
of great interest, as bearing on the latter event, was
printed in the Revista Historica> of Lima. The
manuscript had been only slightly injured by time.
The document was found in a collection of
papers among the archives of the Convent of
Santo Domingo, at Lima. It is a narrative of the
execution, and of the events which preceded it,
by Friar Gabriel de Oviedo, Prior of the Convent
of Santo Domingo, at Cuzco, who was an actor in
the events he describes.
We thus have, in Ocampo and Oviedo, two
eye-witnesses of the same event, entirely indepen-
dent of each other.
The narrative of Oviedo would have been
included in our volume if it had arrived in time.
For the sake of completeness, and as it is very
short, it is considered that the issue of a translation
separately, to be put with or bound up in the
volume, is justified.
CLEMENTS R. MARKHAM,
President.
MONT ESTORIL, LISBON.
January 1908.
A NARRATIVE
Of what took place in the City of Cuzco, respecting the
arrangements which his Majesty ordered to be made
with the Inca Titu Cusi Yupanqui, and of the course
which the war took that was made in consequence.
O N the 20th of July, 1571, the most excellent Lord
Don Francisco de Toledo, Viceroy of these
Kingdoms of Peru, sent for Friar Gabriel de Oviedo,1
at that time Prior of the house of San Domingo, in the
City of Cuzco, of the Order of Preachers, and consulted
with him how best to carry out the order received from
his Majesty to arrange for the Inca, now retired in the
mountains of the province of Vilcabamba, to come forth
in peace. His Majesty intended to show favour, and
to pardon any injury previously done to Spaniards; and
that the said Inca should live quietly like a Christian,
as was reasonable.
It seemed to the said Lord Viceroy that this business
should be undertaken by an ecclesiastical person of
learning and authority, who would best explain the
intentions of his Majesty. He desired that the said
Friar Gabriel de Oviedo should undertake this duty in
person, to which the Friar consented, and that he should
select a secular person of letters to accompany him,
that he might undertake any business of a secular
character that might arise. The Licentiate Garci Rios
was chosen, and, the duty having been accepted by the
Friar Gabriel de Oviedo, the mission was arranged in
the following manner.
1 The manuscript is not signed nor dated ; but a passage further
on proves that Friar Gabriel de Oviedo was the author
In the first place there was delivered to them the
agreements and concessions which the Licentiate Castro,
formerly Governor of these Kingdoms, made in the name
of his Majesty to the said Inca, with confirmation sent
from Spain by those of the Royal Council of the Indies,
and approved by the Royal person of his Majesty.
Also they were given the letter which his Majesty
wrote to the said Inca Titu Cusi Yupanqui, which was
as reasonable and Christianlike as was to be expected
from so Christian a Prince. With it was delivered a
translation of the substance of the said letter, for guidance
in any negotiations or treaties which it might be desirable
to make with the said Inca.
There was also delivered to them the Bull of Dispens-
ation, granted at the request of his Majesty, to enable
Don Felipe Quispi Titu, son of the said Titu Cusi
Yupanqui, to marry Dona Beatriz Coya, his first cousin.
Also sufficient authority was given by the Ordinary,
the see of Cuzco being vacant, to visit the said province,
and to preach ; and certain instructions from the Lord
Viceroy to make a settlement and establish order in
the said province, with needful powers. With these
documents, and others delivered to the Licentiate Rios,
they left the City of Cuzco on August 20th of the said
year.
On the 20th they arrived at the station of Huampu,
in the encomicnda granted to Nuno de Mendoza, inhabited
by the Indians of Curamba. This place is two days’
journey from the province of Vilcabamba. From thence,
on the 22nd of August, they sent four principal Indians
of the said encomienda to the Inca with letters announcing
that they were coming, by order of his Excellency, and
in the name of his Majesty, to treat with him on matters
relating to his peace and Christianity, and to explain
to him the desire of his Majesty for his good, and that
he should not live in those fastnesses but in the land
of Christians, where he might live as one, with the
comfort that was reasonable. To treat of these things
with him, they desired to know where they should con-
verse with him. If he wished them to come to his
land he was requested to send Indians with balsas for
them to cross the river of Acobamba that they might
be able to fulfil their mission.
The said principal Indians departed with this message
on the 28th of August, and we were waiting for the reply
for three weeks. Finding that they were delayed, we sent
two other Indians to descend to the river and find out
what had become of the first messengers. Three days
after we had despatched these second messengers, only
one returned, badly wounded on the head and hands, and
with a lance wound in the abdomen. He reported that
the Indians of the Inca had killed his companion, and
that they intended to kill him, but he escaped with a
wound from a stone.
We then sent two principal Indians, some Canaris of
our company, and fifty other Indians to find the dead
body and learn what had happened. They found the
body, reported that the first messengers crossed the river,
but could not discover who the Indians were who had
killed one of the second messengers and wounded the
other. On the receipt of this news we determined to
go down to the River Acobamba. So we departed from
Huampu on the 3rd of October of the said year, and
reached the banks of the river on the 6th with the
intention, if we could procure any kind of balsay of crossing
it and proceeding to the land of the Inca. We waited for
two days on the banks, but could find no means of crossing
it, though we made fires at night that the Indians might
see us and come to take us across. No one gave a sign,
so we determined to return.
With this failure and bad news we came back to the
City of Cuzco on the 18th of October. His Excellency
then ordered, to give the message greater authority, that
our messenger should be a cavalier named Tilano de
Anaya1 who was major-domo of the said Inca in Cuzco,
with whom he had communications on business. This
cavalier was ordered to take another route by the bridge
near Ollantay-tambo, where there is a way into the
province of Vilcabamba. He set out with our letters,
and with instructions from his Excellency not to delay
at the bridge but to push on, with two Indians, and not
to stop until he had delivered the letters into the hands
of the said Inca.
The said Tilano de Anaya set out, and arrived at the
province where he met Indians of the Inca apparently
with peaceful intentions. They received our people with
much rejoicing, the party consisting of two captains of the
Inca and about thirty Indians, at a distance of half
a league from the bridge. The said Anaya, being in his
tent, they surrounded it, and pierced him with lances until
he was dead, throwing his body down the side of a ravine
into the river below. They also killed the Indians who
were with him, only one escaping to bring the news to I
Cuzco.
On hearing of the death of the said Anaya and judging
the news to be true, the Viceroy called a council, on Palm
Sunday, the resolution being to make war on the Inca,
and to give a reward to the man who captured him. The
officers for the war were:—
1 Tilano de Anaya, a citizen of Cuzco, was married to Dona Juana
Machuca, and left several children, the eldest being named Bartolome’
de Anaya. Seeing the poverty in which the widow was left on his
death, the Viceroy assigned her an annual income of 500 dollars on
9th October, 1572. On 20th June, 1578, her pension was raised to
812 dollars, out of the land tax of Huaynacota, for her and her eldest
son for life.
General …. Martin Hurtado de Arbieto, of
Cuzco.
Captains …. Martin de Meneses,
Antonio de Pereira,
Martin Garcia de Loyola, Knight
of Calatrava.
Captain of Artillery Ordono de Valencia,1 of Lima.
Camp Master. . . Juan Alvarez Maldonado, of Cuzco.
These marched by the road of Acobamba, which is
the way by which we went.
Another detachment was sent under the orders of
Gaspar de Sotelo, of Cuzco, with instructions from his
Excellency that if the Inca, without knowing what had
happened, and before warlike operations had commenced,
should come forth peacefully, he should be received and
given all security on the part of his Majesty.
The troops advanced to make war and took the province
of Vilcabamba. It was found that the Inca Titu Cusi
Yupanqui had been dead for nearly a year, and that
when we arrived at the river to negotiate with him,
although it was concealed from us at the time, as the
Indians wished that we should not know of his death,
he was then dead. It also became known, in the town of
Vilcabamba, that some captains of Tupac Amaru (who
was he that succeeded) had killed the first Indians
who were sent, and the Spaniards found their bodies
at the foot of some rocks.
In the said town of Vilcabamba were imprisoned Don
Felipe Quispi Titu, son of the said Titu Cusi Yupanqui,
with all his household. Tupac Amaru, from terror at
the fury of the Spaniards, not daring to trust himself with
them, with his captain general named Yulpa Yupanqui,
1 Ordono de Valencia accompanied the Viceroy Toledo in his
journey to the south. He was appointed also to make a visitation of
the valleys and parishes of Cuzco,
fled towards the province of the Mafiaries. Captain
Loyola, with some of his company, went in pursuit,
overtaking and capturing him.
When the war was finished his Excellency ordered
that a town should be peopled by Spaniards in that
province, and that all the prisoners should be brought
to Cuzco.
On the day of St. Matthew of the year 1572
the captains entered the city with the captive Incas,
triumphing over them. They brought also all the people
that belonged to them, the bodies of Manco and Titu
Cusi, and the wives and children of the captives. They
were taken to the fortress which his Excellency had
ordered to be made in the house of Don Carlos Inca.
The captives were divided among the monks to be
catechized and taught the things appertaining to our
Holy Catholic Faith. Don Pablo Tupac Amaru and Don
Felipe Quispi Titu, with their wives and children, fell
to the Order of Santo Domingo with this object. They
were taught as much as the time would admit of, and
that it might be done more conveniently, I the said Friar
Gabriel de Oviedo1 took as my share the instruction
in catechism and doctrine with two monks of our Order
who were very well acquainted with the native language.
It was wonderful, especially as regards Tupac Amaru, to
find that heathens, who had never been taught the
things of our Holy Catholic Faith, should have shown
such intelligence in understanding it. In three days
they knew all that was necessary to enable them to
be baptized. Not only did they show these good results
but they pressed us to teach them more each day,
saying that, though they were to be killed, they wished
to be Christians and to die Christians.
Before the Viceroy made that war, though after he had
sent troops to make it, the news came that the Indians
in Vilcabamba had killed Friar Diego Ortiz, of the
Augustine Order, who was teaching them, a mestizo
named Martin, and a negro of the Inca.
After Tupac Amaru had been catechized, they con-
demned him to death, and they took him to be beheaded
on a scaffold which was ordered to be built. He died
with great knowledge of God, and with complete dis-
illusion respecting his idolatry; as was proved by the
discourse he addressed to his countrymen before he was
beheaded. There was an immense assemblage of Indians.
It was a striking sight to behold. A great cry arose when
they saw him on the scaffold, showing the deep feeling of
the people at his death. All were weeping and shouting.
By simply raising his hand the Inca obtained a profound
silence, and all stood as if they were of stone. He then
delivered a discourse on the false nature of their idolatry,
and on the artifices by which his ancestors had induced
them to believe in it. He exhorted them all to believe in
the true God of the Christians. It was marvellous to see
the singular animation and force which God appears to
have put into the mind of this Indian. For only just
before he was so dismayed that he prayed me to spare
his life and that he would be my servant. The Viceroy
received this discourse from the testimony of many
persons of authority who were present and understood
the language. He sent it to his Majesty and to those of
the Royal Council of the Indies that they might see it.
For it certainly was an important matter, by facilitating
the work of preaching to these people.
After he had delivered this discourse they beheaded
him. His head was ordered to be stuck on a pole, and
his body was given to the Friars of Santo Domingo for
sepulture. It was worthy of note that great numbers of
Indians were all that night round the pole mourning for
their Inca, insomuch that the Viceroy feared that they
would come to worship it, so he gave orders to have the
head taken down and buried with the body.
Execution was also done on two captains of the Inca
who were the most culpable respecting the deaths of the
Friar and of Anaya. Others, who seemed to be less
culpable, had their hands cut off.
Besides this, proceedings were commenced against
certain principal Incas who resided in Cuzco; chiefly
against Don Carlos Inca, a resident in that city who
held encontiendas from his Majesty in the province of
Ayaviri, Hatunccara, and Muyna, and other places, with
10,000 castillanos of rent. He was the son of Paullu
Inca, who was one of those that helped the Marquis
Don Francisco Pizarro. Proceedings were also taken
against his brother Don Felipe, Don Diego Cayo, Don
Alonso Titu Atauchi, Don Agustin Conde Mayta,
principal men of Cuzco, and very near relations of the
Incas. They were ordered to be banished from Cuzco
and sent to the City of Kings there to undergo their
banishment.
Together with these, four or five children of the Incas
of Vilcabamba, the eldest being four years of age, were
banished. Among these was a child three years old,
son of Don Pablo Tupac Amaru who was beheaded,
named Martin. There was also banished, with these, Don
Felipe Quispi Titu, son of Titu Cusi Yupanqui, a youth
aged eighteen, whom his father had intended for his
heir in Vilcabamba.
All these were sent by the Viceroy to Lima. I do not
know what became of them but it was thought desirable
that they should not be in Cuzco, being important persons
who might cause some rebellion.
The Viceroy has made a report to his Majesty and to
the Royal Council of the Indies of all the circumstances,
and of all that has happened in much detail. What is
here written is only what relates to these Incas, and some
things of which I was an eye witness, having been the
instrument in connection with them, and having dealt
with them under my hands.
GABRIEL DE OVIEDO.
Cuzco.