Text by Ilias Anagnostakis

Determined to break the siege of Cuzco, in Peru, by 20,000 to 100,000 Incas (depending on the contemporary and ancient sources) and decisively strike the Neo Emperor-stasist, Manco Inca Yupanqui, the two younger brothers of Francisco Pizarro, Hernando (35 years old) and Pedro (23 years old) attempted to attack the young (21 years old) Inca leader at the stronghold-nest, the powerful fortress of Ollantaytambo, in southern Peru, a practically impregnable location nestled in the Andes.

Indeed, on a dark night in early January 1537, the two brave brothers made their way out of the besieged city, suffocatingly surrounded by natives, Cuzco, with 70 horses, 30 elite infantry, and 30,000 native allies (mostly Canaries, from the shores of the Pacific). Gabriel de Rojas was left in Cuzco with the remaining weaker Spaniards. Hernando Pizarro marched his force down the Yucay with great difficulty, for the meandering river often ran against the steep rocky hills that enclose its valley.

‘It had to be crossed five or six times, and each ford was defended.’ The Spaniards finally reached Ollantaytambo after continuous fighting, but they were appalled when they came in sight of its massive pale grey walls. ‘When we reached Tambo we found it so well fortified that it was a horrifying sight.’ Within a day, they had covered the thirty kilometers that separated them from the inaccessible fortress-nest of the demon Manco Inca Yupanqui and decided to attack immediately.

However, 30,000 Incas were waiting for them, and they had prepared an elaborate trap, “so that no Spanish dog would escape, especially their Indian scoundrel allies.” Led by the ever-furious Hernando Pizarro, the seventy Spanish cavalrymen attacked recklessly, only to be repelled by a force of 10,000 Incas, who sallied out from the well-fortified stronghold.

At the same time, the thirty Spanish infantrymen and 2,000 Indian allies faced a flanking attack from another 20,000 Incas, while the remaining Canaries faced a tremendous onslaught from Tupi cannibals from the Amazon, apparently summoned by the demon Manco to bolster their numbers. Facing an incredibly large number of arrows, stones, rocks of all sizes, and projectiles of all kinds, the Spanish began to retreat. As Pedro Pizarro himself later admitted: “There were so many Indians, the pressure was so great that even if there were more of us, we would all have been killed.” On the opposite side of the stream stood the Inca slingers. ‘The indigenous warriors engaged us from three angles: some positioned on the slopes, others stationed across the river, and the remainder within the town…. The Inca himself held fort within the stronghold alongside numerous well-equipped fighters.’

A lone staircase ascended to the citadel. The entrance below had been obstructed by a solid wall of stones, forcing any intruding Indian to crawl through. Two seasoned conquistadors valiantly rode their steeds toward the town walls, but ‘it was astonishing to witness the barrage of arrows that descended upon them upon their retreat, accompanied by deafening cries’. Meanwhile, another contingent of horsemen attempted to assault the terraces beneath the citadel. However, the defenders ‘rained down such a deluge of boulders and unleashed such a relentless barrage of slingshots that, even if we had been more numerous Spaniards, our fate would have been the same — utter annihilation’.

As if that weren’t enough, Inca engineers had diverted the waters of the neighboring Vilcanota River, turning the valley in front of the Ollantaytambo fortress into a lake, making it extremely difficult for the Spanish to maneuver, with the water reaching up to the middle (!) of the horses.

However, Manco Inca had another unpleasant surprise in store: he himself rode a horse, while some of his men had shields (!) spoils from previous victories. Of course, the accuracy of the Incas was not the best when it came to firearms, while on the contrary, with a slingshot projectile, they could break a sword (!) from a hundred and fifty meters away.

Despite this, in another demonstration of how brave and ruthless the Pizarro family was, whose conqueror of Mexico, Hernan Cortes, was a relative, the two brothers Hernando and Pedro broke through the encirclement, “fighting like madmen,” leaving 13 dead horses, 8 infantrymen, and over 1,500 Indian allies slaughtered by the raging Incas, and by the even crazier Tupi.

Despite his success, the young Manco never managed to take Cuzco, where despite the tight siege by 100,000 Incas, the 196 Spaniards (110 infantry, 86 cavalry), 6 black slaves, as well as 500 Canary and Chachapoya Indian allies held out for six (!) months, (including the three young Pizarro brothers, Hernando, Gonzalo, Pedro, and other fighters like Martin de Florencia, Alonso de Toro, Gabriel de Rochas, the Greek Petros from Crete, responsible for the only (!) cannon of the garrison, Hernan Ponce de Leon, and many others) until reinforcements arrived under Francisco Pizarro himself, from Lima with 100 horses and 250 infantry, and his partner, Almagro, who “went up” from Chile with 400 men, in rather dire condition, since the campaign in Chile was a complete failure, temporarily of course.

In 1544, Manco was now dead, and the fight would be continued by his son, Tupac Amaru, until his capture and execution by the Spaniards in 1572. Peru was now Spanish, and the Inca Empire was history, while the siege of Cuzco is considered one of the most significant of all time.

Sources:

Relación del sitio del Cuzco y principio de las guerras civiles del Perú hasta la muerte de Diego de Almagro

Relación del descubrimiento y conquista de los reinos del Perú

J. Hemming, “The Conquest of the Incas “, publ. Mariner Books, 2003