A struggle for power resulted in a long civil war between Francisco Pizarro and Diego de Almagro in which Almagro was killed. Almagro's loyal followers and his descendants later avenged his death by killing Pizarro in 1541. This was done inside the palace of Francisco Pizarro in a fight to the death by these assassins, most of which were former soldiers of Diego de Almagro who were stripped of title and belongings after his death. Despite the war, the Spaniards did not neglect the colonizing process. Spanish royal authority on these territories was consolidated by the creation of an
Audiencia Real, a type of
appellate court. In January 1535,
Lima was founded, from which the political and administrative institutions were to be organized. In 1542, the Spanish created the Viceroyalty of New Castile, that shortly after would be called
Viceroyalty of Peru. Nevertheless, the Viceroyalty of Peru was not organized until the arrival of a later Viceroy,
Francisco de Toledo, in 1569. Toledo ended the indigenous
Neo-Inca State in Vilcabamba, executing the Inca
Túpac Amaru. He resettled the indigenous people in Spanish-style settlements in a process called
reductions, promoted economic development using commercial monopoly and increased the production of the silver mines of
Potosí, using an Inca institution of forced labor for mandatory public service called
mita. The integration of Spanish culture into Peru was carried out not only by Pizarro and his other captains, but also by the many Spanish who also came to Peru to exploit its riches and inhabit its land. These included many different kinds of immigrants such as Spanish merchants, peasants, artisans, and Spanish women. Another element that the Spanish brought with them were African
slaves to work alongside captive Incas for use in labor with things such as agriculture and mining for silver. These people all brought with them their own pieces of Spanish culture to integrate into Peruvian society.
Effects of the conquest on the people of Peru The long-term effects of the arrival of the Spanish on the population of South America were catastrophic. While this was the case for every group of Native-Americans invaded by Europeans during this time period, the Inca population suffered an exceptionally dramatic and rapid decline following contact. The population decline for the Inca Empire from 1520 to 1571 is roughly estimated at from 10 to 15 million in 1520 to less than 3 million in 1570 with the population still declining after 1570. The single greatest cause of the decimation of native populations was Old World infectious diseases, carried by colonists and conquistadors. As these were new to the natives, they had no acquired immunity and suffered very high rates of death. More died of disease than any army or armed conflict. As the Inca did not have as strong a writing tradition as the Aztec or Maya, it is difficult for historians to estimate population decline or any events after conquest. But, it is sometimes argued, and equally disputed among scholars that the Inca began to contract these diseases several years before the Spanish appeared in the region, as it was possibly carried to their empire by traders and travelers. The outbreak, argued to be hemorrhagic
smallpox, reached the Andes in 1524. While numbers are unavailable, Spanish records indicate that the population was so devastated by disease that they could hardly resist the foreign forces. Historians differ as to whether the illness of the 1520s was smallpox; a minority of scholars claim that the epidemic was due to an indigenous illness called Carrion's disease. In any case, a 1981 study by N. D. Cook shows that the Andes suffered from three separate population declines during colonization. The first was of 30–50 percent during the first outbreak of
smallpox. When a
measles outbreak occurred, there was another decline of 25–30 percent. Finally, when smallpox and measles epidemics occurred together, which occurred from 1585 to 1591, a decline of 30–60 percent occurred. Collectively these declines amounted to a decline of 93 percent from the pre-contact population in the Andes region. Mortality was particularly high among children, ensuring that the impact of the epidemics would extend to the next generation. Beyond the devastation of the local populations by disease, they suffered considerable enslavement, pillaging and destruction from warfare. The Spanish took thousands of women from the local natives to use as servants and concubines. As Pizarro and his men took over portions of South America, they plundered and enslaved countless people. Some local populations entered into vassalage willingly, to defeat the Inca. Native groups such as the
Huanca,
Cañari,
Chanka, and
Chachapoya fought alongside the Spanish as they opposed Inca rule. The basic policy of the Spanish towards local populations was that voluntary vassalage would yield safety and coexistence, while continued resistance would result in more deaths and destruction. Another significant effect on the people in South America was the spread of Christianity. As Pizarro and the Spanish subdued the continent and brought it under their control, they forcefully converted many to Christianity, claiming to have educated them in the ways of the "one true religion." With the depopulation of the local populations along with the capitulation of the Inca Empire, the Spanish missionary work after colonization began was able to continue unimpeded. While some historians claim it took just a generation for the entire continent to be under Christian influence. Colonial efforts to evangelize the Central Andes were met with a variety of responses, including acceptance, resistance, and revolt in the form of the
Taki Unquy movement.
Environmental impact The arrival of the Spanish also had an unexpected impact on the land itself. Recent research points out that the Spanish conquest altered Peru's shoreline. Before the Spaniards arrived, inhabitants of the arid northern Peruvian coast clad massive sandy ridges with an accidental form of "armor",
millions of discarded mollusk shells, which protected the ridges from
erosion for nearly 4700 years prior to the Spanish arrival, and produced a vast corrugated landscape that is visible from space. This incidental landscape protection came to a swift end, however, after diseases brought by Spanish colonists decimated the local population and after colonial officials resettled the survivors inland, without humans to create the protective covering, newly formed beach ridges simply eroded and vanished. According to archaeologist Torben Rick, parts of the northern coast of Peru may look completely natural and pristine, "but if you rewind the clock a couple of millennia, you see that people were actively shaping this land by creating beach ridge systems". The shift to large-scale mining in the Andean highlands as a result of Spanish conquest also affected the environment. The center of highland mining was
Potosí, which became the main source of silver in the world. Before the colonization of Potosí, the Inca Empire had mined silver in the region of Poroco, a town located to the south. However, in 1545 a native of the region of Cuzco discovered the large deposit of silver in what became known as
Cerro Rico (Rich Hill). Eventually this information was brought to the Spaniard Juan de Villarroel who, with the help of seventy-five other Spaniards, formally founded Potosí in 1545. The discovery of Cerro Rico ultimately led to the Spanish emphasis on silver mining and production in the Andean highlands. With such a large reserve of silver, the Spaniards turned to the
mercury amalgamation process to refine the silver ores and, increasingly, to the local mining of mercury. Records indicate that the mines in nearby
Huancavelica generated between 50,600 metric tons to 51,300 tons of mercury during the colonial period. The environmental impact was significant. Large amounts of mercury were released into the atmosphere and local watersheds, affecting plants and animals throughout the region. Peru was not the only region affected as gaseous mercury was released during the refining process, eventually reaching as far as
New Spain. ==In fiction==