Indigenous Peoples Issues and Resources (repost by RL)

Indigenous Peoples Issues and Resources

On This Day: In 1532 Francisco Pizarro, Fernando de Soto, and friar Vincent de Valverde delivered the Requerimiento, demanding Inca Emperor Atahualpa to yield to the Spanish. When Atahualpa refused, Pizarro declared the Inca an enemy of the Church and Spain. The Requerimiento (Spanish) "requirement" as in "demand") of 1513 was a written declaration of sovereignty and war, read by Spanish military forces to assert their sovereignty (a dominating control ) over the Americas. Written by Council of Castile jurist Juan López de Palacios Rubios in 1513, it was used to justify the assertion that God, through historical Saint Peter and appointed Papal successors, held authority as ruler over the entire Earth; and that the Inter Caetera Papal Bull, of 4 May 1493 by Pope Alexander VI, conferred title over all the Americas to the Spanish monarchs. Two days later, the Spanish launched an attack on Atahualpa and Cajamarca, known as the Battle of Cajamarca. The "battle" involved the massacre of thousands of Atahualpa's unarmed entourage of nobles and attendants, in the great plaza of Cajamarca. The seizure of Atahualpa marked the opening stage of the conquest of the pre-Columbian Inca civilisation of Peru.