Almagro’ sseverely tested expedition
arrived at Cuzco empty-handed in early 1537
tofind the Pizarros fighting a widespread Inca
rebellion. The Spanish won the war within a
year, but armed resistance against them lasted
for another 35 years. By then, both Almagro
and Francisco Pizarro were dead.
The enmity between the two former part-
ners broke into open warfare soon after Alma-
gro’s return from Chile. His forces were defeated
in 1538 by Pizarro, who ordered Almagro exe-
cuted. Almagro’s followers took revenge in 1541,
assassinating Francisco Pizarro in Lima.
ORELLANA AND
THE AMAZON
When Francisco Pizarro lay dying in Lima, his
brother Gonzalo was lost in the jungles east of
the Andes. As his share of the conquest, Gon-
zalo had been appointed governor of Quito
and other provinces comprising modern
Ecuador. The Spaniards were lured by storiesThe Legend of El Dorado
in La Canela, the “Land of Cinnamon,”
allegedly located in the east.Pizarro, Peru, and South America B 75
Diego de Almagro was granted control of Cuzco, a city in south central Peru, in the 1530s, following the
Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire. Shown in this contemporary photograph is the Sacred Valley of
the Incas, or the Urubamba River valley, located about 10 miles north of Cuzco.(PhotoDisc)