Huayna Cápac

Wayna Qhapaq

Huayna Cápac or in Quechua spelling Wayna Qhapaq [ ˈwaina ˈqʰapax ] (* around 1476 in Tumipampa ; † around 1527 in today's Colombia ) was the 11th king of the Inca .

Life

Huayna Cápac got its name, which means "young ruler" in Quechua, because he succeeded his predecessor Túpac Yupanqui ( Tupaq Yupanki , also Thupa ) on the throne around 1493 as a very young man at around 17 years of age . He was the first Inca ruler who was not born in Cusco and ruled until his death around 1527. He was the father of Ninan Cuyochi , who was to become his successor, but who probably died of the same contagious disease before Huayna Cápac himself , as well as the later Incas Huáscar ( Waskar ), Atahualpa ( Atawallpa ), Túpac Huallpa ( Tupaq Wallpa ), Manco Inca Yupanqui ( Manqu Qhapaq ) and Paullu Inca ( Pawllu Inka ).

Expansion of the Inca Empire (1438–1527)

Huayna Cápac continued the expansion of the Inca Empire, which had begun under his predecessors and had already shifted mainly to the north under his father. He waged war for a few years in what is now Ecuador or Colombia and built the city of Quito ( Kitu ) into the capital of a territory connected with the Inca Empire, which nevertheless developed certain independent features and competed internally with the traditional center of Cusco.

Death and succession

Around 1527 Huayna Cápac and a large part of his troops, who were in what is now Colombia, probably fell ill with smallpox or a comparable disease that was probably introduced by the Europeans to the South American continent and also in the areas they had not yet visited as it were spread as a “harbinger” of their arrival. Even before Huayna Cápac himself, his favorite son and desired successor Ninan Cuyochi died of the disease.

The resulting unclear succession situation is seen as an occasion for the destabilization of the empire, which ultimately led to the Inca civil war among his surviving sons. In the south, with the capital Cusco, Huáscar laid claim to the throne, who represented the traditional Inca nobility and was regarded by them as a legitimate heir; in the north around the new capital Quito his half-brother Atahualpa, who descended on his mother's side from a pre-Inca ruler of this city and was supported by the local military nobility. A few years later, the civil war made it much easier for the Spanish conquistadors under Francisco Pizarro to quickly subjugate the Inca Empire with little strength .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Wolf-Eckhard Gudemann (Red.): Lexicon of history. Orbis, Niedernhausen / Ts 2001, ISBN 3-572-01285-6
2. ↑ María Rostworowski : Enciclopedia Temática del Perú. Vol. I, El Comercio, Lima 2004, ISBN 9-9727-5201-1 , p. 67.
3. ↑ Peggy Goede: Inca civil war . In: Caminos (project on the history of Latin America), as of July 2010.

predecessor	Office	successor
Túpac Yupanqui Tupaq Yupanki	Inca Cuzco 1493 - 1527	Huáscar and Atahualpa Waskar and Atawallpa