The Rise and Fall of Indian-White Alliances: A Regional View of “Conquest” History
HE colonial history of Latin America usually begins with the drama of conquest, and this is, by and large, appropriate. Yet anyone who has read Bernal Diaz del Castillo knows that beneath the broad outline of conquest exploits lies a more subtle history of Indian-white alliances. The assistance of poweiful regional kingdoms like Tlaxcala in Mexico, or that of the Huanca people in Peru, proved critical to the Spanish conquest of the Aztec and Inca empires. Such alliances expressed the internal contradictions and discontents that plagued Aztec and Inca rule, and the failure of these empires to eradicate the independent military potential of resentful ethnic kingdoms. Yet we also know that mutually beneficial alliances between Spaniards and restive Indian peoples could prove short-lived. SpanishTlaxcalan relations soured after a "positive" early phase, and in 1564 the Huancas joined their former Inca enemies in a plot to throw off Spanish rule. ' This article explores the early history of Indian-Spanish relations in Huamanga, a highland region in the heartland of the former Inca empire.2 The story focuses not on a major ethnic kingdom that emerged as