Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 12.djvu/681

 QUICHUA

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QUICHUA

mixed blood. At the period of its greatest expansion, about the year 1500, the Empire of Peru probably con- tained at least ten million souls. Under the Spaniards the natives rapidly decreased. In 15S0 an official cen- sus gave them as 8,280,000 souls. In 18.39 d'Orbigny estimated the Quiehua and Ay- mard groups re- spectively at approximately 1,- 393 000 and .561,- 000 souls, about one third of each bemg of mixed blood. The pres- tnt total prob- ibh approximates 2 500,000.butsep- \r it( Indian fig- uics ire not avail- xble

The founda- tions of Quiehua history are laid in the mythic period, but the sequence of events may be traced with fair degree of probability back to about the year 1000. According to tradition their culture hero" appeared first at Tiahuanuco (Lake Titicaca) ; he brought about order upon earth and apportioned its sovereignty among four rulers, one of whom was Ayra-Manco. Ayra-Manco was one of three wonder- working brothers, who, with their three sisters, had their residence at Pavec-tambo, "House of Venera- tion", south of the site of Cuzco, or according to another version, at Paucar-tambo, "House of Beauty", some two hundred miles to the north-west. Owing to a dispute over the possession of a magie golden shng the brothers separated, two of them being finally transformed into stone statues, while the third by supernatural command journeyed to Cuzco (i. e. navel, or centre), where he built a temple to the sun and estabhshed his capital its the first Inca king of Peru, under the title of Manco Capac, "Manco the Ruler". Eliminating the mythic features, Manco Capac's period is fixed by BoUaert at about the middle of the eleventh century. Without conceding the ex- travagant claims of Montesinos, who gives a list of 101 Inca rulers up to the Spanish conquest, we may as- sume that his work fairly summarizes the historical traditions of the Quiehua. The earlier rulers seem to have devoted their attention largely to the elabora- tion of a calendar, the regulation of reUgion, and the building up of their kingdom by concessions of land to refugees from various quarters. Almost from the beginning there were established cloistered orders of ])riests and virgins of the sun.

There is probably no foundation for the claim advanced by Montesinos that the use of letters was known in remote antiquity, but subsequently lost. So far as known, the quipu was the only mnemonic sj'stem in use in Peru. Rocca, the eleventh (?) ruler before the conquest, is said to have been the first to assume to himself and his successors the title of Inca. The Calchaqui of Tucuman were subdued under Vira- cocha (about 13.30?); the Chincha and Chimu, to the latter of whom belonged the great temple of Pacha- comac, about 1400. The Moxos of eastern Bolivia were brought into alliance by Yupanqui (d. 1439). Tupac Vu]ianqui, toward the close of the fifteenth century, subdued the Canari of Ecuador, and began the conquest of Quitu, which was accomplished by his son, Iluayna Capae, \n 14.S7. Huayna Capac di\'ided the s\('reignty between his two sons, giving Quitu and the northern i^rovinces to Atahualpa, and leaving the southern provinces, or Peru jiroper, to Huascar. On Ills death in 1.52.5 ci\'il war soon broke out, and almost at the same time Pizarro's band landed on the

coast. Huascar was captured by his royal brother and was killed in 1533. Within the year the Empire of Peru was brought to an end, after a short struggle, by the treacherous seizure of Atahualpa him.self by Pizarro, by whom he was executed on 29 August, 1533 (see Peru). Tupac Amaru, nephew of Huascar and last of the direct claimants to imperial dignity, was beheaded by order of the viceroy in 1571.

The natives were now parcelled out into reparli- mienlos and milayos as slaves, or forced labourers, the result being the swift and terrible wasting of their numbers. Although the spirit of the Indians was well-nigh broken there were occasional outbreaks, the most notable of which was the great rising of 1780 led by another Tupac Amaru, claiming descent from the old Inca race, who for a time restored Indian supremacy over a large extent of territory. Being finally taken he was butchered at Cuzco, together with his wife, children and all his relatives, with a

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barbarous cruelty never exceeded in history. His sacrifice, however, resulted in a mitigation of the op- pressive system, which was finally abolished at the close of the war of independence (1S24), in which the Indians bore their full part. With the establishment of settled conditions after the Conquest, the work of Christianizing the natives was begun, chiefly by the Dominicans and Jesuits, and before the close of the seventeenth century practically the whole of the native race of the former empire, west of the Cordil- leras, was converted.

The civilization of the ancient Quiehua was not quite equal in some respects to that of the Maya nations of Yucatan and Guatemala. The social organization, while imperial in form, was really based upon the clan system. For administrative purposes the empire was divided into four great dis- tricts (.■iuyu), respectively north, south, east, and west from Cuzco, the capital. Land was held and tilled by the clan in common, and every able-bodied person, not assigned to other service, was a producer. Of the crop, one-fourth was assigned to the workers and their families; one-fourth to the dependent sick, widows, and orphans; one-fourth to the Government,