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Secondary sourcePainting1532 (depicted); drawing later

Atawallpa Pizarro tinkuy

Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala · 1532 (depicted); drawing later

A drawing by the Andean author Guaman Poma showing Pizarro's meeting with the Inca emperor Atahualpa at Cajamarca.

This drawing depicts Pizarro at the pivotal moment of his first meeting with Atahualpa.

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Black-and-white ink line drawing with a bold Spanish caption across the top reading Conquista and Atahualpa, Ciudad de Caxamarca. A robed friar with a cross faces a kneeling Inca man, while a crowd of Spanish soldiers with spears and Andean figures fills the scene.
Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, drawing of Pizarro and Atahualpa's meeting at Cajamarca.

About this source

What it is

This ink drawing shows Francisco Pizarro meeting the Inca emperor Atahualpa at the city of Cajamarca in 1532. It was made by the Indigenous Andean author Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala as part of his larger chronicle of Peru.

Why it matters

Unlike Spanish accounts, this image was created by an Andean artist looking back on the conquest from inside colonial society. It shows a friar with a cross facing a kneeling Inca man, surrounded by Spanish soldiers and Andean figures, offering a very different viewpoint on the same encounter that Spanish chronicles described.

Look closer

  • Who is shown kneeling, and who is shown standing with weapons — what does that arrangement suggest?
  • Why might an Andean artist draw this meeting differently from a Spanish writer?
  • What does the presence of a friar and a cross tell you about how the Spanish framed the conquest?

This painting is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Francisco Pizarro and Atahualpa on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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