History Spotlight, 1/18

It was on this day in 1535 that Francisco Pizarro, Spanish conquistador, founded the city of Lima, Peru.
Pizarro had led a couple of expeditions down the West coast of South American with differing levels of success. The first one was a failure: he only made it to Columbia (from Panama) and lost a ton of men to disease, hunger and hostile natives. The names given to ports along the way speak of the hard times: Porto del Hambre (Port of Hunger) and Porto Quemado (Burned Port).
The governor of Panama, Pedro Arias Davila, refused to authorize a second expedition, seeing Pizarro as a losing horse. But it was at that point that Davila decided to go exploring northwards in Honduras. His successor, Pedro de los Rios, gave Pizarro his support. It wasn't exactly full-throated support, but it was enough for Pizarro to get going.
Pizarro left Panama with a fleet of 160 ships headed south. They got to the San Juan River (at the modern boundary of Columbia and Bolivia) and split into three groups. Pizarro's group would head upriver to explore the interior. His second-in-command, Diego de Alamgro would head back to Panama for supplies and reinforcements. The chief pilot, Bartolomo Ruiz headed south to explore the coastline.
Ruiz had the best luck, at least from his point of view. He encountered, and subsequently robbed, a raft full of natives from the city of Tumbes. He relieved them of the burden of many yards of cloth, fine ceramics and, most especially, lots of gold and silver. Ruiz's eyes lit up at that and he turned around to meet up with Pizarro.
As it turns out, Pizarro had been having and extremely difficult time in the interior and was only too happy to break off that aspect of the expedition. At that point Alamgro got back with the supplies and troops.
Meanwhile, Governor de los Rios has been hearing all about Pizarro's disastrous first expedition and rumors about what was going on on the second. He decides to not only not authorize a third expedition, but to recall the second. He sent two ships to go get Pizarro.
This only stiffened Pizarros resolve, leading to an agry confrontation where he drew a line in the sand and gave his men the option of going home or staying with him, saying, "There lies Peru with its riches; Here, Panama and its poverty. Choose, each man, what best becomes a brave Castilian" Only thirteen men out of hundreds stayed with him. These were to become known as "The Famous Thirteen."
Pizarro sent Ruiz and Almagro back for provisions and to try and change de los Rios's mind, while Pizarro built a camp to wait it out. After much wrangling and argument, the governor grudgingly gave them a six-month extension and that was all Pizarro needed. In this time, Pizarro discovered the native city of Tumbes, which was a major trading city, even at that time. With undeniable proof of the riches of Peru, Pizarro tried for a third expedition, but was still rebuffed by the governor. He decided to go over his head to King Charles I of Spain. He was dazzled by Pizarro's tales of fabulous riches and quickly authorized the conquest of Peru.
In 1535, he landed on the coast of Ecuador and met up with fellow conquistador, Hernando de Soto and proceed to to Tumbes. The found the town a smoking ruin and all of the people dead. The locals blamed the Punians, a local warlike tribe Pizarro had tangled with before. With his plans of using Tumbes as a base shot, he moved inland and established the city of, San Miguel de Piura, one of the first European-established cities in South America,
de Soto left on various short expeditions to explore the immediate environs of San Miguel and soon brought back a representative of the famed Incan Empire He brought an offer to meet their Emperor, Atahualpa who was relaxing and recuperating in the hot springs at the city of Cajamarca after giving his brother a good shellacking in a civil war.
Pizarro left on the two-month journey to Cajamarca with about 170 men. Things didn't go that well with Atahualpa. For starters, Atahualpa wasn't buying that "We're gods!" routine for a second. He was content to let the common rabble believe it - after all, they thought he was a god too - but he wasn't going to. Secondly, he was fresh on the tails of a massive victory over his brother. Third, it was 80,000 of Atahualpa's men versus under 200 of Pizarro's. Atahualpa can be forgiven for being confident.
Pizarro, for his part, was in a bit of a pickle. He knew that a stand-up fight with Atahualpa was suicide. He also knew that he couldn't retreat without looking weak and inviting an attack. Furthermore, he couldn't just hang out because the more time spent fraternizing with the natives, the more they would come to the same conclusion that Atahualpa had: these guys were frauds. On top of that reinforcements were 2,000 miles away.
This standoff led to the Battle of (or Massacre at, if you like) Cajamarca. Pizarro invited Atathualpa into the walled city for a nice dinner and chat. For reasons unknown, Atahualpa left all of the 80,000 outside the city and only brought in his retinue. Once they reached the center of town, the signal was given and the Incas were attacked with cavalry charges, (which they had never seen) and massed gunfire (which they had never received). Atahualpa was captured and held for a ransom of one 22x17 room full of gold and two 22x17 rooms full of silver (nobody mentions how high the ceiling was). After the ransom was received, Pizarro had Atathualpa executed anyway.