Francisco Pizarro Essay, Research Paper

Francisco Pizarro was born in the year 1445 in Trujillo, Spain, a small town near Caceres, Spain. He was the son of a Spanish infantry captain. He spent his childhood in one of the poorest regions of Spain with his grandparents. He never really learned to read and write.

In 1502, he traveled to the Caribbean Island of Hispaniola with the governor of that Spanish colony. Pizarro took part in an expedition to Columbia in 1510, and three years later accompanied Vasco Nunez de Balboa in a journey that ended the discovery of the Pacific Ocean. He served as a mayor of a town called Panama from 1519 to 1523.

Pizarro soon found out about a very wealthy group of Indians to the South. He soon got two of his friends to form an expedition to explore and conquer the land. A soldier named Diego de Almagro provided the equipment while the vicar of Panama, Hernando de Luque took care of the fees.

Pizarro’s first expedition was two years of suffering and hardship but the second was a little better, he sent Almagro back for reinforcements. Pizarro and a few others remained on an island. Instead of sending help, the governor of Panama sent vessels to bring back the expedition. Pizarro did not wish to return. He then drew a line in the sand. The people that wanted to stay stood on his side of the line. Thirteen men crossed the line to join him. Pizarro’s friends persuaded the governor to send one vessel. Pizzaro used it to explore the coast of Peru. After exploring the coast he returned to Spain in 1528 to ask authority to conquer Peru. This was soon granted.

Pizarro left Spain on January 19, 1530, and sailed from Panama the following year. He had three vessels which contained fewer than two hundred men and twenty seven horses. After seven years of hardships and disappointment, the adventurers started the conquest of Peru. Pizarro spent a year conquering the coastal settlements. He then marched inland to the city of Cajamarca. There he met with emissaries of Atahuallpa, the Inca Emperor. Atahuallpa accepted an invitation to visit the Spanish commander and arrived attended by crowds of unarmed Incas. Pizarro’s followers were armed and waiting. Atahuallpa was going to regret trusting Pizarro. When Atahuallpa refused to convert to Christianity or to accept the Spanish king as his sovereign, Pizarro and his men seized the Inca Emperor and the Spaniards slaughtered two thousand of Atahuallpa’s people.

Atahuallpa offered, as ransom, to fill with gold a room seventeen by twenty two feet to a point as high as a man could reach and to fill it twice over with silver. Pizarro was not slow to accept the ransom. Soon afterward he had Atahuallpa executed. Pizarro then marched to Cuzco and set up Manco, Atahuallpa’s brother as nominal sovereign. In 1535 he founded Ciudad de los Reyes (city of Kings) which is now Lima. The city was the seat of his new government. Manco escaped and headed an unsuccessful uprising. Two or three years later Pizarro and Almagro quarreled over the territory each was going to govern. This contest soon assumed the proportions of a civil war. Those who supported Pizarro captured and executed Almagro. The discontented followers of Almagro then conspired against Pizarro. They assassinated Pizarro in Lima on June 26, 1541.