The History of the Incas [1572] is one of the most important manuscripts surviving from the Spanish Conquest period of Peru. Written in Cuzco, the capital of the Inca Empire, just forty years after the arrival of the first Spaniards in the city, this document contains extremely detailed descriptions of Inca history and mythology. It was written, on the orders of Viceroy Francisco de Toledo, by the highly educated Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa, a sea captain and royal cosmographer of the viceroyalty.

The royal sponsorship of the work guaranteed Sarmiento direct access to the highest Spanish officials in Cuzco. It also allowed him to summon influential natives, as well as those who had witnessed the fall of the Inca Empire, so that they could relate their stories. Sarmiento traveled widely and interviewed numerous local leaders and lords (curacas), surviving members of the royal Inca families, and the few remaining Spanish conquistadors who still resided in Cuzco. Once the first draft of the history was completed, in an unprecedented effort to establish the unquestionable authenticity of the work, his manuscript was read, chapter by chapter, to forty-two indigenous authorities for their commentary and correction.

After the public reading, which occurred on 29 February and 1 March 1572, the manuscript was entrusted to Jerónimo de Pacheco, a member of the viceroy's personal guard. Pacheco was to take the manuscript to Spain and deliver it to King Philip II, along with four painted cloths showing the history of the Incas and a number of other artifacts and objects that Toledo had collected. However, due to a series of unusual events, this irreplaceable document of Inca history was relegated to obscurity for centuries. Most importantly, a short time after the completion of Sarmiento's History of the Incas, Toledo's forces captured the last royal Inca, Tupac Amaru, in the jungles of Vilcabamba to the northwest of Cuzco. For more than forty years, members of the former ruling family had maintained a government in exile in Vilcabamba and had carried out a guerrilla war against the Spaniards. The capture of Tupac Amaru brought an end to the war, and after a hastily arranged trial, Tupac Amaru was beheaded in Cuzco on 24 September 1572. Thus, by the time Sarmiento's document reached the king of Spain, the Inca had already been executed and the long-standing rebellion against Spanish rule had been ended.

As a clear violation of the European tradition of the divine right of kings, the killing of Tupac Amaru by Toledo disturbed King Philip II. It is said that when the monarch saw Toledo on his return to Spain nearly ten years later, the king angrily told Toledo that "he had not been sent to Peru to kill kings, but to serve them" (Garcilaso de la Vega 1966:1483 [1609:Pt. 2, Bk. 8, Ch. 20]). Toledo was to die in Spain soon afterward, dishonored and unrewarded after more than a decade of service to the king in Peru. Similarly, it appears that Sarmiento's History of the Incas, a product of Toledo's much-criticized administration of Peru, was undervalued, set aside, and subsequently forgotten.

The work resurfaced two hundred years later in 1785 when the private library of Abraham Gronovius was sold to the Göttingen University Library. However, another century passed until the existence of the manuscript was revealed to the world by the librarian Wilhelm Meyer. The historian Richard Pietschmann immediately began editing the manuscript, and in 1906 he published the first transcription of the work. The first English translation was produced by Sir Clements Markham the following year.

Sarmiento and His General History of Peru

Sarmiento's History of the Incas must be seen as the result of the great social and administrative changes that took place during Toledo's monumental term as viceroy of Peru (1569-1581). Francisco de Toledo y Figueroa, the third son of the Count of Oropesa, reached Peru with clear instructions from the Crown and unparalleled powers to carry them out. Philip II had charged the new viceroy with ending the tradition of encomiendas in Peru, a highly confrontational task in which one of his predecessors had already failed, resulting in a bloody rebellion against the Crown. Toledo was also told to put an end to the long-standing war with the Incas of Vilcabamba and to completely reorganize the administration of the viceroyalty.

Blessed with notable zeal and formidable energy, Toledo left Lima early in his term to carry out a general inspection of the Andean kingdom of which he was in charge (Table 1). This inspection lasted four years. The viceroy and his entourage left Lima for Cuzco and the highlands of Peru on 23 October 1570. They made various stops along the way to conduct inspections of areas such as Jauja (20 November 1570), where Gabriel de Loarte, president of the court of the Audiencia of Lima, joined the delegation. From Jauja they continued toward Cuzco, inspecting various regions as they traveled, including Guamanga (14 December 1570), Pincos (31 January 1571), Limatambo (7 February 1571), Mayo (13 March 1571), and Yucay (19 March 1571). During each of these visits, they met with the eldest and most notable inhabitants, in particular the leaders, curacas, and Incas. Through these interviews, they obtained information about the government, economic life, and religious customs of the Incas. Traveling from place to place, Toledo eventually reached Cuzco in late February or early March of 1571, just in time to control the election of the town council (AGI, Lima 110), and to have the formidable Juan Polo de Ondegardo appointed for another term as corregidor of Cuzco. Toledo departed for Collasuyu a little more than a year later, in early October 1572. By 1573 he had reached southern Bolivia, and after a humiliating military defeat at the hands of the indigenous group of that region (the Chiriguanas), Toledo concluded his general inspection and returned to Lima.

One of the most important projects that Toledo initiated during the course of his general inspection was the writing of a historical overview of the regions that he now controlled. This large project was entrusted to Captain Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa. Toledo had great trust and respect for Sarmiento, who had accompanied the viceroy on his journey across the Andes. He described Sarmiento to the king of Spain as being extremely competent, and he would later personally come to his aid when Sarmiento was imprisoned in Lima.

Although Sarmiento traveled within Toledo's entourage and enjoyed his newly appointed position as royal cosmographer, he was already a controversial figure in Peru. Sarmiento had left Spain in 1555 for Mexico and Guatemala and reached Lima two years later. A great mariner and an excellent geographer, he had already helped discover the Solomon Islands (1567), sailing under the command of Alvaro Mendaña. Later, after the general inspection was completed, Toledo sent him on an unsuccessful mission to capture Sir Francis Drake in 1579. Later still (in 1581), Sarmiento would be given permission by King Philip II to explore the Strait of Magellan to establish a new colony in that remote region. In 1586 he was captured by the English and taken to England, where he remained prisoner for a year before being released.

Sarmiento was also accused of being an astrologer and incurred the wrath of the Holy Office of the Inquisition on two separate occasions. In December of 1564, the archbishop of Lima, Fray Jerónimo de Loayza, imprisoned Sarmiento while a causa de fe was initiated against him (Medina 1952:214 [1890]). He was accused by the Holy Office of having magic ink, which no woman, receiving a love letter written in it, could resist, and also of being in possession of two magic rings engraved with Chaldean characters. He was found guilty, in a trial that seems to have been more politically than religiously motivated, and on 8 May 1565 was sentenced, among other things, to hear mass in the cathedral of Lima, "stripped naked and holding a lighted taper in his hand" (Means 1928:463). Ten years later, in 1575, Sarmiento was again brought in front of the Inquisition for having magical amulets in his possession. However, on this occasion, Toledo himself ordered Sarmiento's release so that he could continue his work for the Crown.

But let us return to 1572 and Sarmiento's work in Cuzco. In response to Toledo's orders to write a history of the Andes, Sarmiento developed an ambitious research plan. He envisioned a general history of Peru that was to be divided into three parts. In the first chapter of his History of the Incas, he provides a clear outline of what was to be included in each of the parts.

This general history that I undertook by order of the most excellent Don Francisco de Toledo, viceroy of these kingdoms of Peru, will be divided into three parts. The first will be a natural history of these lands, because it will be a detailed description of them that will include the wondrous works of nature and other things of much benefit and pleasure. (I am now finishing it so that it can be sent to Your Majesty after this [second part], since it should go before.) The second and third parts will tell of the inhabitants of these kingdoms and their deeds, in this manner. In the second part, which is the present one, the first and most ancient settlers of this land will be described in general. Then, moving into particulars, I will write of the terrible and ancient tyranny of the Capac Incas of these kingdoms until the end and death of Huascar, the last of the Incas. The third and last part will be about the times of the Spaniards and their noteworthy deeds during the discoveries and settlements of this kingdom and others adjoining it, divided by the terms of the captains, governors, and viceroys who have served in them until the present year of 1572. (Sarmiento 1906:10 [1572]:Ch. 1)

The first part of his general history was to be a geographical description of all the lands of the kingdom. It was to contain the "wondrous works of nature and other things of much benefit and pleasure." A great deal of this work was to be based on the information that was being collected as Toledo and his followers conducted their general inspection of the Andes. However, since Toledo and his party were to move on from Cuzco to the Charcas, Sarmiento felt that in 1572 the first part of his general history was still incomplete. The work seems to have been well advanced, however, since he tells the king: "I am now finishing it so that it can be sent to Your Majesty after this [second part]."

Sarmiento continued to write Part One as he traveled with Toledo toward modern Bolivia. Catherine Julien (1999:79) notes that there are two letters, both written on the same day (16 May 1575), indicating that Sarmiento continued to research and write a full three years after The History of the Incas was completed and sent to Spain. The first of these letters was written by the president of the Royal Audiencia, who notes:

He [Toledo] has done a very curious thing that will please those who govern this kingdom because he has ordered a good cosmographer to visit all of the provinces and towns, of both Spaniards and Indians, and take the latitude of them and describe them with painting and to write the customs and laws the Inca used to govern them and all of their rites and ancient ceremonies. (Julien 1999:79; translation by Julien)

The second letter was written by the Audiencia of Charcas. It, too, noted the remarkable work of a cosmographer (i.e., Sarmiento):

. . . about the description of all this land that the cosmographer has made and the true history of all that happened in Peru with the information he has taken from those who have been longest in this kingdom, which is something of great importance so that the truth about everything will be known and consent will not be given to circulate in print some false histories. (Julien 1999:79; translation by Julien)

The above letters suggest that Part One of Sarmiento's general history had gone well beyond the "wondrous works of nature" described earlier, to include sections on the customs, laws, rites, and ancient ceremonies of the different regions. In addition, it seems that Toledo expected Sarmiento to use his observational and cartographic skills to paint what he observed so he could illustrate the text of his history. That paintings were created to illustrate the first part of the general history demonstrates that the painted cloths that accompanied the second part, sent to the king, were not a unique initiative. Unfortunately, if in reality the first part of the general history and its accompanying paintings were ever finished, they have not been found and are feared lost.

The second part of Sarmiento's general history, herein referred to as The History of the Incas, tells of the Andean past before the arrival of the Europeans. This portion of the three-part series was largely researched in Cuzco and was completed in early 1572. Its information was primarily gleaned from interviews that Sarmiento conducted with the native authorities of the Inca heartland. It contains very little of the information gathered during Toledo's general inspection between Lima and Cuzco, since that information was to be presented in the first part of the general history.

Fortunately, the king's own copy of Sarmiento's History of the Incas has survived in an excellent state of preservation. Written in a clear and steady hand, bound in green leather and red silk, the manuscript can be seen in the library of Göttingen University. Its elegantly plated title page reads: "Second part of the general history called Indica, which by order of the most excellent Don Francisco de Toledo, viceroy, governor, and captain-general of the kingdoms of Peru and steward of the royal house of Castile, Captain Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa wrote" (Figure I.1).

The third and final part of Sarmiento's general history was to cover the period of Spanish rule in the Andes. It was to begin with the discovery and settlement of South America and include the most notable deeds of the "captains, governors, and viceroys who have served in them until the present year of 1572." Antonio Baptista de Salazar (1867:262-263 [1596]), general assistant to Toledo, appears to have seen parts of this work. This is not surprising, since Salazar had traveled to Cuzco with Sarmiento and Toledo, and may have been in Cuzco for the reading of Sarmiento's completed History of the Incas. In a chapter titled "On the investigation that the viceroy ordered made concerning the origin and descendant of the Incas," Salazar writes:

Because this city is the ancient court and seat of the Incas, whom they called lords of these kingdoms, and because there are still many of the old Indians and a few of the first conquistadores alive, [the viceroy] ordered investigations and inquiries carried out, in written and painted form, on the genealogy, origins, and ancestry of the Incas before they all die. He confirmed that they were tyrants and not true lords, as had been believed until then. And because of what was written in two printed books, one about the origin of this new discovery and the other about the events of the civil wars that occurred between the Spaniards, [Toledo] ordered all the information known by the old conquistadores [collected] so that both newly corrected histories could be completed, filled with truths about many things that were not told in the other [works]. He assigned this [task] to Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa, a cosmographer, who has a great capacity for understanding in this, [aided by] a scribe before whom the above-mentioned [people] would give their depositions, and who could swear to everything. I do not know in what state this work was left or what has happened to the papers, which were of great importance and interest.

Salazar confirms much of what we already know about Sarmiento's research on the Incas. Most of the research was conducted in Cuzco and included interviews with the older natives and the few surviving members of Pizarro's forces. Furthermore, the results of Sarmiento's research on the history of the Incas, which took both written and painted forms, supported the view that the Incas were tyrants and not legitimate rulers of the Andes. Salazar also suggests that, while in Cuzco, Sarmiento was working on one, perhaps two other volumes, covering the discovery of the New World and the first decades of Spanish rule in the Andes. Unfortunately, the fates of these works remain unknown.

Sarmiento's History of the Incas (1572)

Sarmiento's 1572 manuscript is composed of a 10-page letter to King Philip II, 262 pages of text, and a final Certificate of Verification that covers 11 pages. It also contains three coats of arms. The cover page displays the coat of arms of Castilla and León (Figure I.2). This is followed by the ornate title page, which is followed by the royal coat of arms of King Philip II (Figure I.3). Next is the above-mentioned dedicatory letter to King Philip II, which was signed by Sarmiento in Cuzco on 4 March 1572. The history ends with the coat of arms of the commissioner of the work, Francisco de Toledo (Figure I.4). The Verification and the final signatures of the witnesses follow this.

In his concluding letter to King Philip II, Sarmiento clearly delineates his sources for his work. He writes:

I have collected this history from the inquests and other investigations that, by order of Your Excellency, have been carried out in the Jauja Valley and in the city of Guamanga and in other areas through which Your Excellency has come inspecting. But [the history was] principally [collected] in this city of Cuzco, where the Incas had their continuous residence, and [where] there is more information about their deeds . . . (Sarmiento 1906:130 [1572]; emphasis added)

Although informed by his journey through the central Andes, The History of the Incas was largely the product of material gathered during his stay in the Cuzco region.

In his cover letter to the king, Sarmiento also reveals the reason why The History of the Incas was written. It was to be a true history of the Incas, challenging and discrediting earlier reports that presented the Incas as the rightful and natural lords of the Andes. He emphatically states that since the information provided to earlier authors about the history of the Incas was incorrect, it led them to false conclusions concerning Spain's right to rule the Indies:

[But as] the information provided to [the scholars] about the deeds [of the Incas] was indirect and not the truth, [the scholars] concluded that these Incas, who were in the kingdoms of Peru, were the true and legitimate kings of these lands and that the curacas were and are the true natural lords of this land. These [statements] gave rise to doubts among strangers to your kingdom. Catholics as well as heretics and other unbelievers discussed and aired their complaints about the rightful pretensions that the Spanish kings had and still have over the Indies. (Sarmiento 1906:4 [1572])

There is no doubt that The History of the Incas was written in direct reaction to the works of men such as Bartolomé de Las Casas, whom Sarmiento singles out for specific criticism in his cover letter to the king. The account's purpose was to show that the Incas were not the legitimate kings of the Andes and thus to support Spain's right to rule the kingdom of Peru.

Moreover, the work was written to champion Toledo's massive reforms of Andean culture. Sarmiento also explains this in his cover letter to King Philip:

[This work is] to give a secure and quiet harbor to Your Royal conscience against the tempests [generated by] your native vassals, theologians, and other learned [individuals] who are misinformed about the events here. Thus, in [Toledo's] general inspection, which he is personally carrying out all across the land, he has examined the sources and spoken with a large number of witnesses. With great diligence and care, he has questioned the most important elders and those of greatest ability and authority in the kingdom, and even those who claim some stake in it because they are kinsmen and descendants of the Incas, about the terrible, deep-seated, and horrendous tyranny of the Incas, who were tyrants in this kingdom of Peru, and about the specific curacas of its towns. [He does this] to disabuse all those in the world of the idea that these Incas were legitimate kings and [that] the curacas were natural lords of this land. So that Your Majesty might be informed, with little effort and much interest, and so that others of differing opinion might be disabused [of their ideas], I was ordered by the viceroy Don Francisco de Toledo, whom I follow and serve in this general inspection, to take charge of this business and to write the history of the lives of the twelve Incas of this land and of the origin of its natives until their end. (Sarmiento 1906:7 [1572])

Thus, beneath a thin veil of history, Sarmiento's 1572 work was to play an important role in addressing the mounting criticisms of Spanish rule in the Americas and offset the Black Legend disseminated by Las Casas and his followers. First, his general history was meant to illustrate the illegitimate nature of Inca rule. Sarmiento is relentless in this effort. While recounting the lives of each of the Incas, Sarmiento repeatedly questions their legitimacy. Second, his general history was to show that each of the Incas committed crimes against natural laws and were thus tyrants and unfit to rule. Again, he returns to this point over and over as he describes the lives of each of the Incas. And just in case a reader might have missed his lines of reasoning, Sarmiento presents a summary of the alleged evidence against the rulers of the realm in his penultimate chapter titled "Noting how these Incas were oath-breakers and tyrants against their own, in addition to being against the natives of the land" (Chapter 70). Sarmiento's third political agenda in writing The History of the Incas was directed against the curacas, the natural (i.e., local) lords of the region. The alleged tyranny and the supposed illegitimacy of the claims to power of the local lords were relevant to the great social reforms that Toledo was introducing into the countryside. These included the creation of reducciones, new towns based on Spanish-inspired grid systems and principles of organization. These new settlements were established through the forced abandonment of innumerable villages, and their creation marks one of the largest demographic movements in the Americas. If the curacas' power was illegitimate, then they could not invoke their ancient rights in court cases protesting any government changes in local life (Sabine Hyland, pers. comm., 2004). The illegitimacy of the curacas is specifically addressed in Chapters 50 and 52, where Sarmiento describes the replacement of all local curacas with political appointees. Clearly, Sarmiento's work must be evaluated within the context of the social issues of his time as he attempts to strengthen the moral hand of King Philip II and to justify the broad reforms that were being conducted by Toledo.

This portrayal of Inca history was one that Sarmiento continued to propound for much of his life. Nine years after the completion of The History of the Incas, Sarmiento was briefly in Spain, where he met with the king and secured permission to map the Strait of Magellan and establish a new colony with himself as governor. Apparently, before he left Spain for the southern tip of South America, Sarmiento submitted another report to the court providing advice on how the king should continue to protect his control over Peru. Unfortunately, the full contents of this report have not been described. However, Markham provides a short quote from it. In his 1581 report, Sarmiento writes:

I left in Lima the eldest son of Titu Cusi Yupanqui, named Quispi Titu. He is in the house of a half-caste, his cousin Francisco de Ampuero. I advise that the king should order these Incas to be brought to Spain, or somewhere away from the people of Peru. The people always retain the memory of the Incas in their hearts and adore one of the Inca lineage. (Sarmiento, 1581 letter to the king, cited in Markham 1895:xix)

Although we know few details of the 1581 report other than those provided by Markham, we do know that the report was immediately archived. A 1581 entry by the Council of the Indies reads:

In terms of Pedro Sarmiento's testimony of what he says of the Inca, the Council does not think that there is anything that should cause concern because the Indians are more or less without leadership and with less strength than ever and the Spaniards with greater presence with all of this known by Your Majesty, the viceroy shall be written to, to be warned of this and to advise him to understand [this].

According to the opinion of the Council, Sarmiento's 1581 report did not contain urgent information, since "the Indians are more or less without leadership." Nevertheless, the Council advised that the viceroy be written to. The king himself then noted in the margin of the entry, "That is good."

Viceroy Toledo and the Painted Cloths

We know from other sources apart from Sarmiento that four painted cloths were prepared in Cuzco during the time that his History of the Incas was being researched. The painted cloths were ordered by Viceroy Toledo and were produced by native craftsmen in the house of Juan Maldonado, just off the central plaza in Cuzco (Iwasaki Cauti 1986:70). On 14 January 1572, Alvaro Ruiz de Navamuel, the king's notary and Toledo's secretary, along with the viceroy himself, presented the painted cloths to thirty-seven representatives of the twelve royal kin groups of Cuzco, many of whom would also be present at the public reading of The History of the Incas that would took place a little more than a month later. Also in attendance was Gabriel de Loarte as well as the translator Gonzalo Gómez Jiménez (Ruiz de Navamuel 1882:247 [1572]).

Through Ruiz de Navamuel's report on the public presentation of these painted cloths, we learn that the first cloth contained images of the Tambotoco origin myth of the Incas as well as the Viracocha creation myth. The second and third cloths presented the history of the Inca rulers of Cuzco. Figures of each of the Incas were painted on these in medallions, along with portraits of their wives. Information on their royal kin groups and the history of their reigns was placed around the edges of the cloths. We can speculate that the history of the Inca kings portrayed on these two cloths was evenly divided between the first six and the last six Incas, corresponding to the traditional Hanan (Upper) and Hurin (Lower) divisions of Cuzco. We are also told that Ruiz de Navamuel verified these cloths after their public reading by placing his rubric on each of the cloths. It is also recorded that Sarmiento placed wind roses on these cloths to indicate the location of the towns, but that these were not read to the natives, since they did not understand them (Ruiz de Navamuel 1882:250 [1572]).

The final painted cloth contained a large genealogical tree of the royal kin groups of Cuzco. References to the different sizes of the painted cloths are noted within an inventory of King Philip's estate (Dorta 1975:70). Three of them were almost the same size, and one was considerably longer and narrower. The longer one most likely contained the genealogical record of the royal kin groups (Julien 1999:76-77). While the first three painted cloths appear to have been approved with little comment, the final cloth caused considerable debate, since various individuals attempted to better their own position and that of their family within the royal ranking (Iwasaki Cauti 1986:70). The strongest argument came from María Cusi Huarcay, the recently widowed sister-wife of Sayre Topa, who questioned why Paullu Inca's branch of the family was placed above that of her father, Manco Inca (Levillier 1940 [1570-1572]; Hemming 1970). The answer to this was, of course, because Manco and his sons (including Tito Cusi Yupanqui, who was still in the Vilcabamba area) had rebelled against the king, whereas Paullu's line, which included the current Inca ruler in Cuzco, Don Carlos, had remained loyal to Spain.

Two days after the painted cloths were seen and validated by the native leaders of Cuzco, they were presented to a distinguished group of Spaniards. These included Alonso de Mesa, Mancio Sierra de Leguizamo, Juan de Pancorvo, and Pedro Alonso Carrasco (all early witnesses to the conquest), as well as the current corregidor, Polo de Ondegardo. Each signed a statement indicating that the genealogical tree and histories shown on the cloths were true and accurate. In early March 1572, Toledo sent the cloths and various other items, including Sarmiento's manuscript, to Spain (Levillier 1921, 3:542-544 [1572]). After being presented to the king, the painted cloths were hung for public display in one of the great halls of the treasurer in Madrid.

It is a curious fact that the paintings were received by King Philip and proudly put on public display for years, but the written work that accompanied the cloths disappeared from view and was never mentioned by the Crown. The paintings were considered to be of such authenticity that in 1586, the granddaughter of Hernando de Soto and Leonor Tocto Chimbo used them in a lawsuit to gain lost revenues for the services of her grandfather (Dorta 1975:71-72). It is believed that the cloths were destroyed more than a century later, in 1734, in a fire that swept through the royal palace (Iwasaki Cauti 1986:67).

Sarmiento de Gamboa as Historian

Despite the fact that Sarmiento had a clear political agenda for writing his History of the Incas, he conducted his research with the utmost care. Realizing that each royal kin group in Cuzco would tell a history that was beneficial to its own social position, Sarmiento went to extremes to collect and compare separate versions of the Inca past. He first met independently with representatives of each of the twelve royal kin groups of Cuzco, listening to them and writing down the most important events of their past. With each group, he then discussed and compared the other versions of the past that he had collected from other rival lineages. Finally, he met publicly with members from all the dynastic groups of Cuzco, and his complete manuscript was read aloud to them in Quechua, the language of the Incas.

Sarmiento describes his methods for researching the history of the Incas in the ninth chapter of his work, as he turns from telling various Inca myths to discussing the legendary first people of the Cuzco Valley. He writes:

. . . by examining the eldest and wisest in all ranks of life, who are the most credible, I collected and compiled the present history, referring the declarations and statements made by one group to their enemies--that is, the opposite faction, because they divide into factions--I asked each one of them for their own testimony about their lineage and that of their opponent. These testimonies, which are all in my possession, I corroborated and corrected with those of their rivals, and finally I had them ratified in public in the presence of all the factions and ayllus, under oath by the authority of a judge; and what is here written was improved with experts in the general language, who were very careful and faithful interpreters also under oath. (Sarmiento 1906:31 [1572:Ch. 9])

At this point in his chronicle, Sarmiento indicates that each royal kin group recorded important events in oral histories as well as in songs that were passed down from one generation to another. Furthermore, the most noteworthy events were recorded on mnemonic devices made of knotted strings called quipu. According to Sarmiento:

. . . these barbarians had a curious method that was very good and accurate to substitute for the lack of letters. It was that from one to another, parents to children, they would recount the ancient things of the past up to their times, repeating them many times, as one who reads a class lesson, making their listeners repeat these history lessons until they remained fixed in their memories. Each one would thus recount his annals to his descendants in this manner, to preserve the histories and feats and antiquities and the numbers of people, towns, and provinces; the days, months, and years; the battles, deaths, destructions, fortresses, and cinchis. Finally, they would record (and still do) the most remarkable things, in both kind and quantity, on some cords that they call quipu, which is the same as saying racional, or "accountant." On the quipu they make certain knots that they recognize, through which, and by the use of different colors, they distinguish and record each thing as if with letters. It is remarkable to see the details that they preserve in these cordlets, for which there are masters as there are for writing among us. (Sarmiento 1906:31 [1572:Ch. 9])

Sarmiento also mentions that there were official state historians who painted the most important events of all "on large boards," and that these boards were kept in "a great hall in the Houses of the Sun." These painted boards were also mentioned by Cristóbal de Molina (1989:49-50 [ca. 1575]), who wrote in Cuzco around the same time as Sarmiento.

The careful manner in which Sarmiento organized and gathered his data is truly remarkable. His access to the highest ranks of the surviving Inca nobility and his rigorous collection methods are two of the factors that establish Sarmiento's History of the Incas as one of the most important documents written during the conquest period.

Verification of the History

Sarmiento fully utilized his official position to fulfill his pledge to write a detailed account of Inca history. Other writers, both before and after Sarmiento, also tried to compose the definitive "true" history of the Incas, but what characterizes Sarmiento's work, and makes it especially important, is the public reading of the manuscript in Cuzco. As an epilogue to his history, Sarmiento includes a unique document titled "Fee de la Provanca y Verificacion desta Historia." This epilogue attests to the fact that in Cuzco on 29 February 1572, Sarmiento formally presented the completed manuscript to the royal notary, Alvaro Ruiz de Navamuel, and to Don Francisco de Toledo. After that, in an act recalling the presentation of the painted cloths several weeks before, Gabriel de Loarte summoned representatives of the twelve royal lineages of Cuzco to hear Sarmiento's completed history read to them in Quechua by the translator Gonzalo Gómez Jiménez.

Thirty-six representatives of the royal kin groups assembled for this public event, as well as six additional men. At least nine of these men had also witnessed the presentation of the painted cloths in January. The reading took two days. Ruiz de Navamuel describes the procedure this way:

They were read [to] and the reading was finished and discussed that same day and the next, from the fable that the Indians tell of their creation until the end of this history of the Incas. As each chapter was read, one by one, it was translated into that language; the Indians [then] talked and conferred among themselves about each of the chapters. Together they all agreed and said through the interpreter that this history was good and true and conformed to what they knew and had heard their fathers and ancestors say and to what they had told their own [kin]. (Sarmiento 1906:133 [1572])

We are told that various minor details of the history, such as the names of persons and locations, were questioned during the public reading and that Ruiz de Navamuel wrote some of the suggested changes in the margin of the document. Other minor changes were made directly to the document itself and hence are more difficult to identify in the manuscript. At the end of the reading, the names and ages of the forty-two witnesses were recorded, and various individuals made their "mark" at the end of the testimony (Figure I.5).

At the end of the first day of reading, Toledo wrote a letter to King Philip telling him that he would be sending a written history of the Inca along with four painted cloths. On 4 March 1572, having received the viceroy's approval of his history, Sarmiento wrote his letter to the king as an introduction to the history. Soon after that, the envoy, Jerónimo Pacheco, left Cuzco for Spain.

Although Sarmiento's work was read to, and approved by, a large number of indigenous leaders in Cuzco, it still must be read with considerable care. As noted above, Sarmiento specifically states that his goal in writing the history was to document the long-standing tyranny of the Incas and thereby illustrate the Spanish king's right to subsume their territory into his realm. Given the fact that the public reading was held under the auspices of the viceroy, there is little doubt that the acceptance of the final document and its politically charged history was a foregone conclusion.

Sarmiento de Gamboa, His Informants, and the Aftermath

Sarmiento collected most of the information contained within The History of the Incas by interviewing various prominent natives of the Cuzco region from February 1571 to February 1572. These interviews supplemented those conducted on behalf of Toledo during this same period. We do not have transcripts of Sarmiento's interviews; however, many of Toledo's have been preserved. The Toledo interviews included information from a large number of older men, many of whom were leading members of the royal houses of Cuzco.

Although we will never know the full range of Sarmiento's informants, there are several individuals who stand out among those who witnessed the reading of The History of the Incas, including Diego Cayo Hualpa, Diego Cayo, and Alonso Tito Atauchi. Short descriptions of these individuals are warranted to illustrate that Sarmiento had access to some of the most important indigenous citizens of Cuzco. Given their high positions in postconquest Cuzco, and the fact that each of their fathers had played important roles in the running of the Inca Empire, one can understand how Sarmiento was able to write such a detailed history.

Among the many noble Incas who were consulted during the preparation of the manuscript was Diego Cayo Hualpa. Cayo Hualpa was a member of Cinchi Roca's kin group and was thought to have been seventy years old at the time that he signed Sarmiento's manuscript. He was also a witness to the painted cloths and he met with Spanish authorities on 18 July 1571 (Levillier 1940:161). In the July interview, we are told that he was a native of Wimbilli (a small village just south of Cuzco where the mummy of Cinchi Roca, the second Inca, was kept), and that Diego Cayo Hualpa's father had been the "curaca of the Indians said to be of the Sun."

Diego Cayo (not to be confused with Diego Cayo Hualpa) was also a prominent leader in Cuzco during the immediate postconquest period. He was considered such an important source of information on the Incas that Pedro de Cieza de León had sought to interview him about the empire in 1550, more than twenty years before Sarmiento was in Cuzco (Hemming 1970:284). Cieza de León writes:

I went to Cuzco . . . where I brought together Cayo Topa [i.e., Diego Cayo], the one living descendent of Huayna Capac, and other orejones [noblemen] who looked upon themselves as nobility. And through the best interpreters to be found, I asked these Incas what people they were and of what nation. (Cieza de León 1976:31 [1554:Pt. 2, Ch. 6])

Diego Cayo signed The History of the Incas as a member of Pachacuti's descent group (Inaca Panaca) and stated his age as sixty-eight. He is also mentioned within Sarmiento's manuscript as a leader of Inaca Panaca. That year Diego Cayo had already been called upon to give testimonies to Spanish authorities on a number of occasions, including 17 July and 5-6 Sept 1571 (Levillier 1940:151, 168, 173), as well as participating in the verification of the cloths on 14 January 1572. In these interviews, we are told that his father, Alonso Yano, had been a "segunda persona" of Huayna Capac. It is also stated that Alonso Yano had been with Huayna Capac during the Collao campaigns and that he had later gone with him to Tomebamba. Accordingly, Diego Cayo is a likely source of information on both Inca Yupanqui and Huayna Capac.

A final example of a witness to Sarmiento's History of the Incas is Alonso Tito Atauchi. He signed both the verification of the painted cloths and Sarmiento's history as the sole leader of Huascar's descent group. This is reaffirmed by Sarmiento within the text of The History of the Incas in his description of Huascar's death:

He did not leave a lineage or ayllu, although of those who are alive now only one, named Don Alonso Tito Atauchi, the nephew of Huascar, son of Tito Atauchi, whom they killed along with Huascar, maintains the name of the ayllu of Huascar, called Huascar Ayllu. (Sarmiento 1906:128 [1572:Ch. 69])

As a grandson of Huayna Capac, Alonso Tito Atauchi was interviewed by Spanish authorities on 5-6 September 1571 (Levillier 1940:167), during which he stated that his father had at times been in charge of governing the kingdom when Huayna Capac was away from Cuzco. Given Alonso Tito Atauchi's high position among the noble houses of Cuzco at the time of the conquest, and having proved himself loyal to the Crown in battle, he was given the hereditary title of "Lord Mayor of the Four Quarters" by the king of Spain. He was even allowed to wear the royal fringe of the Inca and other prominent signs of nobility (Hemming 1970:342; Decoster 2002).

It is clear that Sarmiento interviewed many members of the Cuzco nobility in preparation for the writing of his History of the Incas. During the course of these interviews, little did the participants realize that in just a few months the last rebelling Inca, Tupac Amaru, would be captured and, after a short trial, executed in the plaza of Cuzco. In many ways, this public execution marked the end of the conquest of Peru.

Although the Inca nobles, and many others, willingly participated in the various investigations organized by Toledo in the Cuzco region, they did not necessarily understand that he was considering punishing most of them to bring the indigenous resistance to Spanish rule to a conclusion. On 8 May 1572 (about a month before Tupac Amaru was captured in the wilds of the Vilcabamba region), Toledo suggested to the king of Spain that he could bring the reign of the Incas to an end by destroying the noble bloodlines of Cuzco. Toledo wrote:

It would be sufficient to punish all the Incas [for being] involved in this plot for rebellion. There would be about three hundred who have kinship relations stemming from the Incas, and who preserve their memory and ayllus. (Cited in Hemming 1970:451; Levillier 1924:366)

A short time after the completion of The History of the Incas, Toledo began an initial purge of the Inca nobility in Cuzco, and the most prominent elites were sent to other highland cities or to Lima. Among the unfortunate individuals selected for this removal were Alonso Tito Atauchi and Diego Cayo, both of whom had worked with Toledo to verify the cloths sent to the king and with Sarmiento while he was writing The History of the Incas.

It is also worth pointing out that Sarmiento was not a passive recorder of Inca history, but was instead an active participant in the widespread reforms initiated by Toledo. This is perhaps most dramatically illustrated in the late-June (1572) attack on the Vilcabamba region by Spanish forces. As troops loyal to Toledo entered and occupied the remote town of Vilcabamba, which had been serving as the capital for the Inca court in exile, it was Sarmiento who planted the royal standard and formally declared possession of the city by Spain (Hemming 1970:433).

The Relationships between Sarmiento de Gamboa's History of the Incas and Other Written Works

Establishing the exact relationships between various closely related written works is a complex task. This is especially true in the case of works dating to the early Colonial Period in Peru, when not only did many authors share previously written sources, some of which are now lost, but when they also used many of the same native informants. Nevertheless, there has been considerable research into the writings of various early authors of Peru, and the general relationships between them are becoming clearer (Means 1928; Rowe 1985; Porras Barrenechea 1986; Pease 1995; Julien 2000).

Most important to this study are the relationships between Sarmiento de Gamboa's History of the Incas and the works of Juan de Betanzos [1557], Bernabé Cobo [1653], Miguel Cabello Balboa [1586], Cristóbal de Molina [ca. 1575], Juan Polo de Ondegardo [1559-1560], and Martín de Murúa [1590]. Although these works were composed in different places and in different years, certain sections within each of them provide similar information. To fully understand Sarmiento's History of the Incas, we need to explore the web of written sources and native informants that connects his work to those of other authors who wrote both before and after him.

Juan de Betanzos and Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa

Juan de Betanzos wrote one of the earliest detailed reports on Inca society. Betanzos was an early settler of Cuzco who married an Inca noblewoman. His mastery of Quechua, his close contacts with members of the former ruling class, and his long stay in Cuzco demand that special attention be paid to his works. In 1557 Betanzos completed his work entitled Suma y narración de los incas (Account and narration of the Incas). In the first four chapters of this work, Betanzos recounts several of the Inca origin myths that are also told by Sarmiento (Chapters 6-11), including those describing the creator god's activities in Tiahuanaco, Rachi, and Urcos, as well as the origin of the royal Incas at Pacariqtambo.

A more intriguing overlap of information concerns the death of Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui. Both Betanzos (1987; 1996:138 [1557:Pt. 1, Ch. 32]) and Sarmiento (1906 [1572:Ch. 47]) provide translations of a song that Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui is said to have sung on his deathbed. Betanzos indicates the strength of oral tradition among the Incas, stating that the song "is still sung today in his memory by those of his generation." Furthermore, their descriptions of the battles between Huascar and Atahualpa share striking similarities. Nevertheless, there is no clear evidence that Sarmiento had access to Betanzos' earlier work. These overlaps, and various other ones, can easily be accounted for by widely shared oral traditions in the Inca capital, especially among the members of Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui's kin group.

Bernabé Cobo and Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa

In 1653, Bernabé Cobo, a Jesuit priest and formidable naturalist, finished one of the last and most important chronicles of Peru, the Historia del Nuevo Mundo (History of the New World). Cobo had traveled extensively in Peru, and during the course of his theological training, he had spent several years in Cuzco. Cobo's monumental work is based on his own well-founded inquiries as well as on a series of works written by earlier writers. Cobo used manuscripts stored in secular and ecclesiastical archives of various cities, including Lima, Cuzco, and Arequipa, as well as Juli, the center for Jesuit studies in the Andes. But, like most writers of his time, he was inconsistent in acknowledging his sources. Furthermore, in some sections he mixed information from different sources, and in other places he reproduced entire blocks of data (Rowe 1980:2-3).

In the introduction to Books 12, 13, and 14 of the Historia del Nuevo Mundo, Cobo (1979:98-102 [1653:Bk. 12, Ch. 2]) describes the three major sources that he used while writing his overview of Inca history and religion. By citing these three sources, and by stressing that his information was extracted from earlier experts on Inca history and religion, Cobo hoped to give greater credence and authority to his own writings. Cobo states that his most importance source on the Incas was Polo de Ondegardo's 1559 report (i.e., De los errores y supersticiones de los indios), which had been written after extensive interviews in Cuzco with quipu specialists. In fact, Cobo had the original manuscript with Polo de Ondegardo's own signature that had been sent to Archbishop Jerónimo de Loayza.

In this short section, Cobo also recognizes his debt to Cristóbal de Molina by indicating that he used Molina's "copious account of the rites and fables that the Peruvian Indians practiced in pagan times." This is an unmistakable reference to Molina's Relación de las fábulas y ritos de los incas (Fables and Rites of the Incas) that had been researched and composed in Cuzco around 1575. But Cobo also states that he made extensive use of a report on the history and government of the Incas written for Viceroy Toledo. Cobo writes:

. . . Viceroy Francisco de Toledo took great care in obtaining a true history of the origin and form of government of the Inca kings, and to this end, since he was in the city of Cuzco himself, he ordered all the old Indians who remained from the time of the Inca kings to be brought together. To insure that the proceedings were conducted with less danger of misunderstanding in an undertaking whose ascertainment was so much desired, each Indian was interrogated separately; they were not allowed to communicate with each other. The person entrusted by the viceroy to make this inquiry, who was one of those working under him on the general inspection, made the same careful inquiry with all the old Incas he found in the provinces of Charcas and Arequipa, and with former Spanish conquistadores who were in this land, not a few of whom still lived at that time. (Cobo 1979:100 [1653:Bk. 12, Ch. 2])

This report on the history of the Incas and their form of government was clearly produced during Toledo's relatively short stay in Cuzco (late February 1571-early October 1572). It is odd, however, that Cobo does not mention Sarmiento by name as the author of this report, since Cobo knew of Sarmiento and he specifically mentions Sarmiento's 1580 service to the Crown elsewhere in his work (Cobo 1979:15 [1653:Bk. 11, Ch. 3]).51

There are scattered sections within Sarmiento's and Cobo's work that provide very similar descriptions of events and persons. These sections raise the possibility that Cobo had access to Sarmiento's work and that he extracted information from it to include in his writings. For example, they both provide similar information on the noblewomen who escaped the brutality of Atahualpa after his generals captured Cuzco:

Among those who escaped were Doña Elvira Chonay, daughter of Cañar Capac; Doña Beatriz Caruamaruay, daughter of the curaca [of] Chinchacocha; Doña Juana Tocto; and Doña Catalina Usica, who was the wife of Don Paullu Topa and mother of Don Carlos . . . (Sarmiento 1906:123 [1572:Ch. 67])

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. . . also able to escape were some important women, daughters of great lords, who later became Christians; among them were Elvira Quechonay, Beatriz Caruay Mayba, Juana Tocto, Catalina Usoca, mother of Carlos Inca, and many others. (Cobo 1979:169 [1653:Bk. 12, Ch. 19])

Here, and elsewhere in his work, Cobo may have edited Sarmiento's work and reproduced the information in a more condensed form. Alternatively, these textual overlaps could also have occurred if both Sarmiento and Cobo were copying from an earlier account.

Possible Lost Sources Used by Sarmiento de Gamboa and by Other Early Writers

As stated above, there are many passages in Sarmiento's History of the Incas and in Cobo's History of the New World that suggest that Cobo had access to Sarmiento's work, or that these two authors had access to a shared, but now lost, source of information on the Incas. Additional insights into Sarmiento's and Cobo's works can be gained by comparing these passages with similar ones found in Martín de Murúa's Historia general del Perú [1590] and in Miguel Cabello Balboa's Miscelánea antártica [1586].

As background, it should be noted that Martín de Murúa, a Mercedarian priest and a longtime resident of Cuzco, appears to have been in that city during Toledo's 1572 visit and even witnessed the execution of Tupac Amaru. Murúa finished at least three closely related works on the Incas, the last of which has only recently been published. Miguel Cabello Balboa arrived in the Americas in 1566 and traveled widely, although it is not clear if he arrived in Cuzco. Cabello Balboa was ordained as a priest in Quito in 1571 and started writing his work soon afterward. His Miscelánea antártica was completed in Lima some fifteen years later, in 1586.

There are many overlapping sections within the works of Sarmiento de Gamboa, Cabello Balboa, Cobo, and Murúa, but we will draw examples from their descriptions of the lives of Lloqui Yupanqui and Mayta Capac, two relatively minor Inca kings. Consider, for example, Sarmiento's, Cobo's, and Cabello Balboa's descriptions of Lloqui Yupanqui's arranged marriage with Mama Cava, from the town of Oma. Sarmiento states that the marriage was arranged by Manco Sapaca, Lloqui Yupanqui's brother:

Having heard this and having announced to the people what the Sun had told Lloqui Yupanqui, his relatives decided to find him a wife. Moreover, his brother Manco Sapaca, understanding the disposition of [his] brother, tried to find him a suitable wife. Finding her in a town called Oma, two leagues from Cuzco, he asked her relatives for her and, this granted, he brought her to Cuzco. Lloqui Yupanqui then married her. This woman was named Mama Cava . . . (Sarmiento 1906:45 [1572:Ch. 16]; emphasis added)

In contrast, Cobo suggests that Pachachulla Viracocha, the lord of the Huaro, had arranged the marriage between Lloqui Yupanqui and Mama Cava:

Being persuaded by his men, the Inca made up his mind to marry, and to this end, he had Pachachulla Viracocha called; he was one of the lords from Guaro who had yielded obedience to him, and the Inca commanded that he go to the town of Oma, little more than two leagues away from Cuzco, and that he ask for the daughter of the lord of that town to be his wife. Upon receiving this message, the lord of Oma was very happy about it, and on the advice of the other lords, they gave her to him. This lady was called Mama Cachua . . . (Cobo 1979:116 [1653:Bk. 11, Ch. 6]; emphasis added)

Yet, in the writing of Cabello Balboa, we find an even more intricate passage indicating that it was Lloqui Yupanqui's brother, Manco Sapaca, who contacted Pachachulla Viracocha (the lord of Guaro), to arrange the marriage:

His brother Manco Sacapa (who felt the lack of [a] nephew [and] heir more than any other) held such great hope in his chest [that] he began searching for a legitimate wife for his brother, the Inca. And having communicated the problem to the astute Pachachulla Viracocha, he took charge of it. Well-accompanied, he went to the towns of Oma and he asked their cacique to give his daughter [to] the Inca as [a] wife. She was named Mama Cava and she was granted to him. (Cabello Balboa (1951:283 [1586:Pt. 3, Ch. 12]; emphasis added)

These three passages provide similar, although not identical, accounts of the arranged marriage of Lloqui Yupanqui and Mama Cava. Yet, it is important to note that Cabello Balboa's account is more complete than, and reconciles differences found in, the accounts provided by Sarmiento and Cobo. Because we know that Sarmiento's work was written first [1572], followed by Cabello Balboa's [1586], and then Cobo's [1653], this suggests that all three writers shared a common source. In this case, it appears that Cabello Balboa provides a more complete account of the original source, whereas Sarmiento and Cobo present more fragmentary information.

Additional evidence of a shared source can be found in these authors' descriptions of Lloqui Yupanqui's contact with other leaders in the region surrounding Cuzco. However, in this case, it is Sarmiento and Murúa who provide muddled tellings of the original source, whereas both Cobo and Cabello Balboa offer more complete accounts. Compare the following:

1) He did not leave the area of Cuzco for war, nor did he do anything remarkable, except live like his father, communicating with some provinces called Guaro, [whose cinchi was named] Guamay Samo, Pachachulla Viracocha, the Ayarmacas of Tambocunca, and the Quilliscaches. (Sarmiento 1906:44 [1572:Ch. 16])

***

2) He lived in great peace and prosperity because many people of different nations came to see him from various places; there was a Huaro named Huamac Samo Pachachulla Viracocha and the Ayarmacas and the Quilescaches. (Murúa 1987:60-61 [1590:Bk. 1, Ch. 7])

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3) The first and most noteworthy who came were Guaman Samo (Cacique and Lord of Guaro), Pachachulla Viracocha (a man of great discretion and prudence), and the Ayarmacas nations with their Lords and regents: Tambo vincais and Quiliscochas and other nearby lineages. (Cabello Balboa 1951:283 [1586:Pt. 3, Ch. 12])

***

4) The first ones to do this were from the Valley of Guaro, six leagues from Cuzco; it had many people, and the lords of the valley were very powerful at that time. The most important ones were called Guama Samo and Pachachulla Viracocha. These were followed by the Ayarmacas of Tambocunca and the Quilliscaches with their caciques. (Cobo 1979:115 [1653:Bk. 11, Ch. 6])

All four of these passages appear to have been derived from the same text or oral tradition; however, they each provide slightly different information.

In a final example, let us turn to descriptions of the life of Mayta Capac, the son of Lloqui Yupanqui, or, more specifically, to an event that is said to have occurred while Mayta Capac was still very young:

1) They say that when Mayta was very young, he played with some youths of the Alcabizas and Culunchimas, natives of Cuzco, and hurt many of them and killed some. One day he broke the leg of a son of the cinchi of the Alcabizas after arguing about drinking or drawing water from a fountain, and he chased the rest until they shut themselves in their houses. (Sarmiento 1906:46 [1572:Ch. 17])

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2). . . although his vassals always knew him to be cruel and bloodthirsty, because as a child (playing with others of his age who were native to Cuzco) he would mistreat them, breaking their legs and arms and even killing some of them. On one day in particular he mistreated and badly offended the sons of a certain cacique from Allcayvillas. On that occasion, Culluim Chima . . . (Cabello Balboa 1951:284 [1586:Pt. 3, Ch. 12])

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3) He committed some mischievousness during his father's lifetime that made him hated, though feared. It was so much that when he was playing with some boys of his age and with some natives of Cuzco named Alcyvisas and Cullumchima, he killed the boys and broke their legs and he chased and followed them to their houses. (Murúa 1987:63 [1590:Ch. 9])

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4) Before he got out of his tutelage, while playing one day with some other boys of his age, there was one who told him to look out for himself and mend his ways. (Cobo 1979:118 [1653:Bk. 12, Ch. 7])

In this case, it is Cobo who provides the barest description, while Sarmiento, Cabello Balboa, and Murúa provide different but overlapping accounts.

The quantity of overlapping descriptions provided by these four authors suggests that they shared one or more sources. This source could have been a written document, a single native informant, a narrative recorded on a quipu or on a painted board, a widespread oral tradition, or a complex combination of these sources. Given this conclusion, it is important to note that there are at least two known, but now lost, written sources that all four of these writers may have had access to.

The first possible candidate for the shared information between Sarmiento, Cabello Balboa, Murúa, and Cobo is a work written by Molina concerning the history of the Incas. Molina, in his 1575 report titled "On the Fables and Rites of the Incas" (which was written for the third bishop of Cuzco, Sebastián de Lartaún), summarizes his previous report on the history of the Incas:

The report that I gave to your most illustrious Lordship [Sebastián de Lartaún] described the origin, lives, and customs of the Incas, who were the lords of this land, including: how many [Inca rulers] there were, who were their wives, the laws they made, [the] wars that they waged, and [the] people and nations that they conquered. In some parts of the report, I discussed the ceremonies and cults that they invented, although not in detail.

Unfortunately, Molina's report on the history of the Incas has been lost. However, Cabello Balboa suggests that it was among those that he used while writing his own overview of Inca history (Cabello Balboa 1951:259-260 [1586:Pt. 3, Ch. 9]). Accordingly, much of Cabello Balboa's information on the history of the Incas, and by extension Murúa's, has been credited to Molina (Loaisa 1943; Julien 2000). There are, however, problems in suggesting that Sarmiento and Cobo also had access to it. First, Cobo specifically states that he had a copy of Molina's Fables and Rites of the Incas, but he says nothing of Molina's work on the history of the Incas. Second, although Sebastián de Lartaún, the bishop to whom Molina was reporting, was appointed bishop of Cuzco in 1570, he did not arrive in the city until 28 June 1573 (Esquivel y Navia 1980:232, 246; Urbano 1989:17), a full sixteen months after Sarmiento finished his History of the Incas. According to this timeline, it seems unlikely that Molina's work was the common source for information found in Sarmiento, Cabello Balboa, Murúa, and Cobo.

Another, more likely source for some of the shared information between these four authors is the 1559 report by Polo de Ondegardo. This report is widely recognized as one of the most important documents produced in Cuzco during the immediate post-Inca period. Cobo notes that he had a copy of the report and that he used it extensively while writing his chronicle. Furthermore, Toledo himself appointed Polo de Ondegardo to his second term as corregidor of Cuzco, during the same period that Sarmiento was in the city conducting his interviews. In fact, Polo de Ondegardo was present for the viewing of the painted cloths (16 January 1572), and there is no doubt that Sarmiento would have had close contact with Polo de Ondegardo during their time in Cuzco. Likewise, Cabello Balboa (1951:257 [1586:Pt. 3, Ch. 9]) indicates that he had both read and admired the works of the "learned and studious Licenciado Polo." And it is clear that Murúa had access to the 1585 abstract of Polo de Ondegardo's 1559 report, published by the Provincial Council of Lima, and he may also have been in Cuzco during Polo de Ondegardo's 1571-1572 term as corregidor. In sum, until further information becomes available, or new documents are found, it seems possible that some of the overlapping information found in Sarmiento, Cabello Balboa, Murúa, and Cobo was originally collected by Polo de Ondegardo.

It is also possible that there is a more complex combination of overlapping sources. For example, it is possible that both Sarmiento and Cobo incorporated a great deal of information collected by Polo de Ondegardo into their works, whereas Cabello Balboa and Murúa relied more heavily on Molina's lost report on the history of the Incas. In this scenario, there would be substantial overlap between all four authors, since Polo de Ondegardo's and Molina's works were both based on the oral traditions of the royal families in Cuzco. Only additional research can untangle this web of lost sources.

Summary

Because no native Andean cultures developed a system of writing, the first written sources on the Incas and their history were produced during the establishment of Spanish rule in the Andes. These documents were written by many different people, including state officials, literate soldiers, and the priests of the many Catholic orders that were quickly established in the region. There are also several large works written by educated citizens, including individuals of Spanish, Andean, and mixed descent. Nearly all of the documents are written in Spanish, although a few are composed in Quechua.

The earliest chronicles from the Andean region are generally dedicated to describing the dramatic first encounters between the Spaniards and the Incas as well as the establishment of Spanish rule. Not surprisingly, these accounts tend to depict a European view of the events, and they therefore provide limited information on the indigenous peoples of the Andes or their histories.

Pedro de Cieza de León's work marks a different direction in Andean historiography. During his extended stay in Peru (1535-1550), Cieza de León walked almost the entire length of the former Inca Empire, and while in Cuzco, he sought out various members of the Inca elite to learn of their history. After his return to Spain, Cieza de León published the first part of his Chronicle of Peru. He was a careful writer, describing what he saw with little embellishment, and he adds greatly to our understanding of the Incas. Nevertheless, his time in Cuzco was relatively short, and much of his writing focuses on the power struggles that occurred between various Spaniards as they fought to maintain their holdings.

Many other writers following Cieza de León composed works on the Incas. But Sarmiento's work is unique among these, not only because of the large scale of his investigation and the dramatic public reading of the manuscript, but also because in 1572 there were still former officials in Cuzco who had held positions of power during the final years of the empire. These men and women were in their seventies and eighties. More numerous, however, were those of a new generation born after European contact. Within just a few years after Sarmiento completed his History of the Incas, the final members of the Inca elite would die. Thus, Sarmiento's work represents one of the largest and last investigations to include members of the Inca elite and their own remembrances of the Inca Empire.