Francisco Pizarro

Francisco Pizarro was born in Trujillo, Spain (then in the Crown of Castile, modern-day Extremadura). He was the illegitimate son of infantry colonel Gonzalo Pizarro (1446–1522) and Francisca González, a woman of poor means. His date of birth is uncertain, but it is believed to be sometime in the 1470s, probably 1475. Little attention was paid to his education and he grew up, and remained, illiterate. His father served in Navarre and in the Italian campaigns under Córdoba. His mother married late in life and had a son, Francisco Martín de Alcántara, who was at the conquest of Peru with his half-brother from its inception. Through his father, Francisco was a second cousin, once removed, of Hernán Cortés. == Early career as Conquistador ==

On 10 November 1509, Pizarro sailed from Spain to the New World with Alonso de Ojeda on an expedition to Urabá. Pizarro became a participant in Ojeda's failed colony, commanding the remnants until he abandoned it with the survivors. He sailed to Cartagena and joined the fleet of Martín Fernández de Enciso and, in 1513, accompanied Balboa in his crossing of the Isthmus of Panama to the Pacific. The following year, Pedro Arias Dávila became the newly appointed governor of Castilla de Oro and succeeded Balboa. During the next five years, Pizarro became a close associate of Dávila and the governor assigned him a repartimiento of natives and cattle. == Expeditions to South America ==

The first attempt to explore western South America was undertaken in 1522 by Pascual de Andagoya. The native South Americans he encountered told him about a gold-rich territory called Virú, which was on a river called Pirú (from which we get the pronunciation Perú). Diego de Almagro was left behind because he was to recruit men, gather additional supplies and join Pizarro later. The Governor of Panama, Pedro Arias Dávila, at first approved in principle the exploration of South America. Pizarro's first expedition, however, turned out to be a failure as his conquistadors, sailing down the Pacific coast, reached no further than Colombia before succumbing to bad weather, lack of food and skirmishes with hostile natives, one of which caused Almagro to lose an eye by arrow-shot. The place names the Spanish bestowed along their route, including Puerto Deseado (desired port), Puerto del Hambre (port of hunger) and Punta Quemado or Puebla Quemado (burned port), confirmed their difficulties. Fearing subsequent hostile encounters like the one the expedition endured at the Battle of Punta Quemada, Pizarro ended his first expedition and returned to Panama. a licence document that authorised Pizarro to proceed with the conquest of Peru. Pizarro was officially named the Governor, Captain general, Adelantado and Alguacil Mayor, of New Castile for the distance of 200 leagues along the newly discovered coast and invested with all authority and prerogatives, leaving his associates in secondary positions (a fact that later incensed Almagro and would lead to eventual discord). One of the grant conditions was that within six months, Pizarro should raise a sufficiently equipped force of 250 men, of whom 100 might be drawn from the colonies. When the expedition left the following year, it numbered three ships, 180 men and 27 horses. with gold and two with silver, Atahualpa was convicted of 12 charges, including killing his brother and plotting against Pizarro and his forces. He was executed by garrote on 29 August 1533. Francisco Pizarro and de Soto were opposed to Atahualpa's execution, but Francisco consented to the trial due to the "great agitation among the soldiers", particularly by Almagro. De Soto was on a reconnaissance mission the day of the trial and execution and upon his return expressed his dismay, stating, "he should have been taken to Castile and judged by the emperor." King Charles later wrote to Pizarro: "We have been displeased by the death of Atahualpa, since he was a monarch and particularly as it was done in the name of justice." Pizarro advanced with his army of 500 Spaniards toward Cuzco, accompanied by Chalcuchimac, one of the leading Inca generals of the north and a supporter of Atahualpa, who was subsequently burned at the stake. Manco Inca Yupanqui joined Pizarro after the death of Túpac Huallpa. == Assassination ==

In Lima, on 26 June 1541 "a group of 20 heavily armed supporters of Diego de Almagro II stormed Pizarro's palace, assassinating him and then forcing the terrified city council to appoint young Almagro as the new governor of Peru". "Most of Pizarro's guests fled, but a few fought the intruders, numbered variously between seven and 25. While Pizarro struggled to buckle on his breastplate, his defenders, including his half-brother Martín de Alcántara, were killed". Pizarro's remains were briefly interred in the cathedral courtyard; at some later time, his head and body were separated and buried in separate boxes underneath the floor of the cathedral. In 1892, in preparation for the anniversary of Christopher Columbus' discovery of the Americas, a body believed to be that of Pizarro was exhumed and put on display in a glass coffin. However, in 1977, men working on the cathedral's foundation discovered a lead box in a sealed niche, which bore the inscription: "Here is the head of Marquess Don Francisco Pizarro who discovered and conquered the kingdoms of Peru and presented them to the crown of Castile." A team of forensic scientists from the United States, led by William R. Maples, was invited to examine the two bodies and they soon determined that the body which had been honoured in the glass case for nearly a century had been incorrectly identified. The skull within the lead box not only bore the marks of multiple sword blows, but the features bore a remarkable resemblance to portraits made of the man in life. == Legacy ==

By his marriage to Quispe Sisa, Pizarro had a son also named Francisco, who married his relative Inés Pizarro, without issue. After Pizarro's death, Inés Yupanqui, whom he took as a mistress, Inca princess and favourite sister of Atahualpa, who had been given to Francisco in marriage by her brother, married a Spanish cavalier named Ampuero and left for Spain, taking her daughter who would later be legitimized by imperial decree. Francisca Pizarro Yupanqui eventually married her uncle Hernando Pizarro in Spain on 10 October 1537; the third son of Pizarro who was never legitimized, Francisco, by Doña Angelina, a wife of Atahualpa that he had taken as a mistress, died shortly after reaching Spain. After his invasion, Pizarro destroyed the Inca state and whilst ruling the area for almost a decade, initiated the decline of local cultures. The Incas' polytheistic religion was replaced by Christianity and much of the local population was reduced to effective serfdom under the Spanish Encomienda system. The cities of the Inca Empire were transformed into Spanish Catholic cities. Pizarro has been reviled for ordering Atahualpa's death despite the ransom payment (which Pizarro kept, after paying the Spanish king his due). Some Peruvians, particularly those of indigenous descent, may regard him negatively. Sculptures In the early 1930s, sculptor Ramsay MacDonald created three copies of an anonymous European foot soldier resembling a conquistador with a helmet, wielding a sword and riding a horse. The first copy was offered to Mexico to represent Cortés, though it was rejected. The statue was taken to Lima in 1934 and re-purposed to represent Pizarro. One other copy of the statue was unveiled in Wisconsin. The mounted statue of Pizarro in the Plaza Mayor in Trujillo, Spain, was created by American sculptor Charles Cary Rumsey. It was presented to the city by his widow in 1926. In Peru, the statue's original location was the atrium of the Metropolitan Cathedral of Lima. In 1952 it was moved to the Plaza Pizarro, and in 2003 it was relocated to Parque de La Muralla after 17 months in a warehouse, without the pedestal with which it was inaugurated and that it had throughout its history, being placed on a concrete base. On 15 January 2025, it was again moved to a pedestrian street next to the Plaza Mayor to be inaugurated, with the pedestal, as part of the city's 490th anniversary on the 18th. Palace of the Conquest After returning from Peru extremely wealthy, the Pizarro family erected a plateresque-style palace on the corner of the Plaza Mayor in Trujillo. Francisca Pizarro Yupanqui and her uncle/husband Hernando Pizarro ordered the construction of the palace; it features busts of them and others. It instantly became a recognizable symbol of the plaza. The opulent palace is structured in four stands, giving it the significance of the coat of arms of the Pizarro family, which is situated at one of its corner balconies displaying its iconographic content. The building's decor includes plateresque ornaments and balustrades. == In popular culture ==

'' by John Everett Millais, 1846 • Pizarro is the title and subject of a dramatic tragedy by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, presented in 1799. Sheridan based his work on the German tragedy by August von Kotzebue, Die Spanier in Peru. • Pizarro is the main protagonist of the theatre play The Royal Hunt of the Sun and a film of the same name. Rather than an accurate depiction of historical events, its subject is Pizarro's spirituality and personal relationship with Atahualpa. The film mostly stays true to the dialogue-based character of the play and a chamber setting while providing respected actors of the time (1969). • Francisco Pizarro is depicted as a major supporting character in The Mysterious Cities of Gold, where he is obsessed with locating one of the seven lost cities of gold. In the English version of the series, the character of Pizarro is voiced by Maurice Podbrey. • The novel "Un puñado de gloria" by Eduardo Sguiglia has Francisco Pizarro as one of the main protagonists and narrates his overthrow and fall. • Pizarro is also the protagonist in the historical novel The Gold of Caxamalca by Jakob Wassermann. • Pizarro is a character in "Surya kandle Sona" (The golden tears of the sun), a novella in Bengali, penned by Premendra Mitra. Pizarro is depicted as a scheming fortune-hunter who conquered Peru by dint of treachery and the ruthless application of the Machiavellian policy of putting expediency above morality. The protagonist of the story is Ghanaram (an ancestor of Ghanashyam Das, a teller of tall tales) who wages a heroic struggle against the Spanish conquistadors to emancipate Peru from the fetters of slavery but ultimately fails to fulfil his mission. (Source: Ghanada Samagra, volume 3, Ananda Publishers) • Randall Garrett, known mainly as a science fiction writer, wrote the novelette Despoilers of the Golden Empire, whose language leads readers to believe they are reading a story about a space invasion in the far future, while in fact it describes Pizarro's conquest of the Incas. As noted by Garrett, every word of the story is historically accurate, but it was written in a deliberately misleading way. • Pizarro appears in 2025's Civilization VII as a conquistador for the Spanish Empire. He is one of the options for a Great Person during the exploration era. == Works of Pizarro ==

• • • "Francisco Pizarro response to a petition by Pedro del Barco", 14 April 1539. From the Collections at the Library of Congress == References ==