FIRST
PART OF THE ROYAL COMMENTS THAT DEALS WITH THE REAL SOURCE OF YNCAS, WHO WERE
KINGS OF PERU, THEIR IDOLATRY, LAWS, AND GOVERNMENT IN PEACE AND WAR AND
ACHIEVEMENTS OF THEIR LIVES, AND THAT WAS ALL THAT IT WAS OF THEIR EMPIRE AND ITS REPUBLIC BEFORE THE
SPANISH ARRIVED TO IT. WRITTEN BY INCA
GARCILASSO DE LA VEGA, NATURAL FROM COZCO AND CAPTAIN OF HER MAJESTY.
Proem
To the reader
Although
there have been curious ones who have written about the republics of the New
World, such as Mexico and Peru and the other kingdoms of the Gentiles, it has
not been the whole account that could
be given about them, I've noticed this particularly in the things I have seen
written about Peru, of which, as someone from the city of Cuzco, which was
another Rome in the empire, and I have longer and more clear news that so far
the writers have given. Truth is that they touch many things however great that
that republic had, but they write them so shortly that even the very noticeable
to me, (in the way that they say) I misunderstand them. Therefore, forced by
the natural love to the motherland, I offered myself the job of writing these
reviews, which will clearly and distinctly show the things that republic had
before the Spanish, and in the rites of their vain religion and the government
in peace and war their kings had, and all the rest about those Indians can be
said, from the tiniest exercises of its vassals to the top of the royal crown.
We write only on the Inca Empire, without going into other monarchies, because
I have no news of them that stand out (1). In the discourse of history we claim
the truth of it, and we shall not say anything bigger that won´t be t
authorized by the same Spanish historians who touched it in part or in whole,
that my intention is not to contradict, but to serve as comment and gloss and interpreter in many
Indian words, which, as foreigners in that language, interpreted outside the
property of it, as it will in the long seen in the discourse of history, which
I offer to the mercy of that readers [...] .
Book I, Chapter XV
The origin of the Inca kings of Peru
Those people living or dying (2) as
we have seen, our Lord God allowed a morning star to come out of themselves, so that in that
dark regions would give them news of natural law and civility and respect than
men should be given to each other, and that the descendants of that, acting
from good to better cultivate those beasts and turn them into men, enabling
them to reason any good doctrine, so that when that same God, Sun of Justice,
send those rays of divine light to those idolaters, they would find them not so
wild, but more docile for the Catholic faith and for the teaching and doctrine
of the Holy Mother Church of Rome, as it has been received over here, as we will
see, one thing and the other, in the course of this history; it is clear from
experience I have noticed how much more
nimble and ready they were to receive the gospel the Indians that the Inca kings ruled and taught, unlike o
other nations where the Incas education
had not reached, many of which are today as barbaric and crude as they were
before, to be seventy-one years the Spanish entered in Peru. And since we are
at the door of this great labyrinth, it will be good to go ahead and give
notice of what was in there.
After having taken many paths and
(3) to give an account for the origin a Incas, that were natural kings of Peru,
I found that the best and the easiest way was tell what was in my childhood was often heard from my mother
and brothers and uncles and others their elders about the origin and beginnings,
because everything that is said in
other ways it is reduced to the same, and you'd better know it by the words of
the very Incas and not from other foreign authors. Thus, my mother living in
Cuzco, their homeland, few relatives came to visit almost every week ,
relatives that escaped the cruelties and
tyranny of Atahualpa (4) (their lives we will tell. In such visits, their more
ordinary conversations were discussing the origin of their kings, majesty of
them, of the greatness of their empire, their conquests and exploits, what the government
in peace and war was, of laws as the benefit and favor their kings ordered
their vassals. In short, they didn´t leave any prosperous thing that had happened
to them out of their account.
From the past greatness and
prosperity they came talk about present things, they cried their dead kings, their
alienated their finished empire and republic, etc. These and similar talks had
the Incas Pallas (tellers)(5. In their views, and the memory of his lost
good, their conversation always ended in tears and crying, saying: "The
reign turned into vassalage... "Etc. In this talk I, as a boy, came and
went many times where they were, and I enjoyed listening, such as rejoice to
hear the tales. So it went on for days, months and years, and I, still sixteen
or seventeen years old, it came to pass that while I was at one of these
conversation, talking about their kings and antiquities, I asked to the oldest
man, the one that was aware of them:
-
Inca, uncle, because there is no writing among you, what is what keeps the
memory of past things among you, what are the news you have of the origin and beginnings
of our Kings? For there, the Spanish, their towns and other nations, know, as
they have divine and human stories:; they know about them, when their kings
began to reign, and how some empires turn into other ones, they even
know how many thousand years God created heaven and earth, all of this and more they know from their books. But you, that lack
of them, what memory do you have from your antiquities? Who was the first of
our Incas, how was he called, and what was his lineage?, How does he began to
reign?, What people and weapons did they use to conquer this great Empire, and
what were our origin ? The Inca, as he was comfortable listening these questions,
for the pleasure he received by giving an account of them, he turned to me (many
other times I had listened to him, but never with that attention then) and
said:
-
Nephew, I'll willingly tell you the most of it. It will be convenient for you to
hear them and save them in the heart (this is their phrase instead of saying memory).
You will know that in ancient times, all the entire region of land that you see
were some big hills and thickets, and in those days people lived like beasts
and irrational animals, without religion or policies (6), without people nor
housing, no sowing nor cultivated land was there; they wouldn´t dress or cover without
their flesh; they did not know how to spin cotton or wool to make any clothing;
they lived in twosomes or and they gathered in caves and crevices of the
earth. They ate like beasts, grass and tree roots and raw fruit and human
flesh. They covered their bodies with leaves and tree bark and animal skins,
others went naked. In short, they lived as deer and wild animals, and they even
got women as brutes, because they could have stable and known ones.
Notice, not to get angry to repeat too
often these words: "Our Father the Sun", which was the language of
the Incas and a way of worship and observance to name the Sun, because they boasted
to be descendants of Him, and those that were not Inca were not allowed to name
the Sun, since it was a blasphemy and so they were stoned if they did so. The Inca continued saying:
-
Our Father the Sun, watching men such as I said, took pity and compassion for
them and was sent from heaven to earth a son and a daughter of his to
indoctrinate people in the knowledge of our father the Sun, to worship Him so they would have him as God to give them
precepts and laws under which they lived as men by reason and civility, to
dwell in homes and villages, so they
would know how to grow plants and crops, raise livestock and enjoy the
fruits of earth as rational men and not beasts. With this order and mandate our
father the Sun put these two sons in Lake Titicaca, which is eighty leagues
from here, and they were told to go wherever they wanted to, and wherever they stop to eat or sleep, they should try to introduce
a yard long gold bar on the
ground. Whenever that bar should sink,
there, the Sun Our Father wanted them to stop and build a capital and create a
court.
Chapter
XIX
The
author protest on History
Now that we have laid the foundation
of our building (even though fabulous) at the origin of the Inca kings of Peru,
it will be reasonable to stop writing on the reduction in the conquest of
indians, and I rather extend myself just the summary that the Inca, my uncle,
gave me on the relationship of many Incas and indians, natives of the towns
that this first Inca Manco Capac reduced and ordered to populate his
empire. Among them I was raised and
communicated until I as twenty years old.
Thorough this time I learned about all that I write now, because in my
childhood these stories were told to me as fables aret told to children. Then,
at older age, they gave greater information about their laws, government,
comparing the new Spanish government with the Inca. Particularly, they divided
crimes and penalties, the rigor of them; they would tell me how their kings came
to act in peace and in war, how they treated their vassals, and how they were
served by them. Besides this, as their own child, they would tell me about
all their idolatry, rites, ceremonies and sacrifices, their main festivals and,
and how they celebrated them; they would tell their abuses and superstitions,
their good and bad omens, and those who they would see on their sacrifices and
out of them. In short, I say that I got news of what they had in their
republic, that if I wrote them, this would be a more abundant story. What
others didn´t tell me, my eyes caught of that idolatry, festivals and
superstitions, which even in my day, to twelve or thirteen years of my age, had
not finished yet. I was born eight years after the Spanish won my land,
and as I said, I grew up there until the age of twenty, and so I saw many
things that the Indians did in that their paganism, which I will tell, because I saw them. Besides
the relationship that my relatives and others that I witnessed, there have been
many accounts of the conquest and the achievements of kings, since when I set out to write this story, I wrote to
my former classmates from the grammar school, requesting each them to help me with this relation the
relationship that could be a particular deed that the Incas achieved in the
provinces of their mothers, because each province has its accounts and knots
with their stories, and tradition, and therefore retains better what happened
to them. My classmates, taking care of what I asked, took my intention to
their mothers and relatives who, knowing that an Indian, child from their land,
wanted to write its events, removed archives from their relations and I sent
them to me. And so I had news of the events and achievements of each Inca,
which are the same as the Spanish historians had, but longer ones, as I
repeatedly mentioned [...] , although some of these things I tell seems to
be fabulous, it seemed a good idea to note them, not to remove the foundations
on which the indians founder bigger and
better things that their empire features; because of this, at the end, from
these fabulous foundations, the greatness of Spain is true today. So I will write what could be more
convenient, to convey the true news of past monarchies, their beginnings and
their ends, that I plainly claim that I
sucked from the milk, in addition to the news I got here from my own
kinship. And I promise that, despite being fond to memories, I won´t stop
telling the truth from the fact, without taking away from the bad nor adding
the good they had, since I well know idolatry is a sea of errors, and I won’t write about new
developments that were missed, but about the same things that the Spanish
historians have written of that land, its kings, and I just will comment on
them when, so it becomes clear that I don´t pretend fictions to favor my
relatives, but I will say the same as the Spanish have said, only to as comments,
to extend on many things they have said and let them imperfect, since they missed
the entire account. Many more details will be added to the stories, some
others will be removed, since they were false leftovers, for the Spanish didn´t
know how to request them, as they didn´t know distinction of times and ages,
and division of provinces and nations .So they failed to understand the Indian
who gave it, because of the difficulty of language. The Spanish thins they know
more, but they ignore nine of ten parts, since, for the many things, a same
word could be used and a different pronunciations for a same diction has very
different meanings. So I will discuss as later in some words that I will be
forced to bring them into account.
Besides this, everything all about
this republic rather destroyed than well known I say, will be simply told, what
in old days was their idolatry, rituals, sacrifices and ceremonies, and its
government, laws and customs, in peace and in war without comparing them to any
other similar ones we find in divine and human stories, neither to the
governments of our time, since that is a odious comparison. Whoever read this,
will be able to compare these stories to his liking, finding similar ones in
ancient times, and in the Holy Scripture as in the profane fables of ancient
paganism. Many laws and customs will resemble
to those of our century; many more you will read that are the entire contrary. For me I've done what I could, having failed to
do what I wanted. You, discreet reader, I beg you to receive my good spirited
intentions, that is to please you and cause you happiness, even though neither my energies, nor the ability of an indian, born and raised
among Indian, among weapons and horses, can get met there.
Book IX, Chapter XXXI
New names to name several
generations
The
best thing that has happened to the Indies, we almost forgot, are those Spanish
and blacks who have been taken as slaves to be served by them; formerly there
wasn´t any in that my land. Out of these two nations, others came to be that
have mixed over there, and to differentiate them, they have been give different
names, to be understood by them. And even though we said this in our history of
La Florida, I say it here again, as
this is its proper place. Thus, the Spanish man or Spanish woman that goes from
here is called Spanish or Castilian, that both names are as one, and so I've
used them in this story and in la Florida. The children of Spanish and Spanish-born
are called criollo or Creole to say
that they were born in the Spanish indies. This name was invented by blacks,
and it shows their work. It meant Indies-born black; to differentiate him from
those going from here, or the ones born in Guinea, because they have for more
and better quality those being born in their own motherland, and parents are
offended if they are called Creoles. The Spanish, by similarity, have
introduced this name in their language for naming the one born there. So
Spanish and blacks born in the Indies are called criollos. When black is
going from here, they simply call him black or
guineo. The son of black and Indian, or of Indian and black, is called mulato and mulata. The children of these two are called cholo. Cholo is word of the
Windward Island, it means dog, not the thoroughbred, but the very rogues ones
(11) and the Spanish used it for infamy and shame. The children of Spanish and Indian
or Indian and Spanish, they call us mestizos,
to say that we are mixed of both nations. This name was imposed by the first
Spanish who had children in an indian, and since it is name being imposed by
our parents and because its meaning to me, I mouthfully call myself mestizo and
I take honor. While in the Spanish
indies, if one of them would say 'you are a mestizo
"or” he is a mestizo ", people take it as offense.[…] I don´t
understand the malice of the imposers, they feel proud of their offences, so we are forced to flee and
abhor the way our parents called us, not
to receive new offensives epithets.
Trans. Alex Salinas
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