The General History of Peru: Book 1

Although it took some time to procure a copy and finally read the translation, The General History of Peru: Book 1 by Martín de Murúa is a must-read. Written and featuring useful footnotes and commentaries by Bauer, Gamarra, and Gonzales Lombardi, the text features a very useful introduction contextualizing the history of the manuscript and its relationship with an earlier text by Murúa. A more substantial work written after an earlier study on the Incas, illustrated by Guaman Poma de Ayala, this chronicle incorporates various types of sources (including common sources utilized by Cabello Balboa, Sarmiento de Gamboa and other chroniclers) to tell the history of the Incas until the fall of Vilcabamba. Whilst its author made a number of errors and misrepresented his work as being substantially based on khipus, and in his own personal life was very likely involved in misappropriation of parish funds whilst living in Peru, his chronicle is perhaps most interesting for its comparisons and contrasts with the famous chronicle/letter of Guaman Poma de Ayala. In addition, it also contains separate chapters on the various coyas or queens of the Inca monarchs, adding an additional layer of information not always retained or presented in the Spanish chronicles. 

As a general overview of the Incas, Martín de Murúa generally follows a similar outline as that of Sarmiento de Gamboa, Cabello Balboa, Cobo, and Molina. The author undoubtedly relied heavily on a common source shared by many of these other chroniclers. His alleged use of sources derived from khipu records is more ambiguous. For instance, he claims to have relied on older khipu records for a description of Tupa Amaru, a brother of an Inca king, including details of his conquests, his wife, etc. Supposedly, this type of khipu which recorded the deeds and affairs of the Inca lords was a dying system in Murúa's time, likely conducted during research in the late 1590s and into the early 1600s. If true, this means that an older system of recording non-numerical information on khipus was dying out by the end of the 16th century, leaving only the more standard types of khipu used to record numerical or statistical information. In other contexts, Murúa explicitly references elders or old Indians as sources of information. This is relevant in his recounting of a fable of an Indian shepherd and a Virgin of the Sun whose forbidden romance precedes their transformation into stones. 

Ultimately, it would appear that Murúa largely relied on information from earlier textual sources as well as some oral traditions. Unsurprisingly, this also meant that the chronicle becomes much richer in detail by the time of Huayna Capac, Huascar, Atahualpa and Pizarro. This period directly preceding the Spanish conquest and being nearer in time in the memories of indigenous people interviewed afterwards meant that the chronicles can provide much more specific information. With the benefit of works by writers like Diego Fernández de Palencia, it became much easier for the chronicler to retell the tale of Pizarro's victories, the retreat by Manco Inca to Vilcabamba, and the eventual demise of the Inca rump state in 1572. Thus, the names of various captains or generals in the Inca expansion and conquests of what is now Ecuador is delineated, as well as more specific narratives of campaigns against other groups or rebellions. According to Murúa, the relocation of Cañari Indians from Ecuador into the Cuzco area as mitimaes likely contributed to the ready allies the Spanish found in their conflict with the Incas.

One of the most intriguing examples of Murúa as a source on the indigenous past of Peru is the narrative of Tupa Inca Yupanqui's alleged travels across the Pacific. Murúa also mentions the islands of Avachumpi and Ninachumbi as one of the conquests of Pachacuti's son, including his return with "black people" and rare objects. Although it is unclear what he based this on, he also writes of the mysterious Pacific islanders not visiting the coast after the arrival of the Spanish. If this is true, then contacts between the islanders and Peru persisted until the Spanish conquest. Murúa's account of this strange but fascinating episode points to the possibility of longstanding ties between the Pacific and Peru.

Unfortunately, we don't have more precise dates for the volcanic activity of Misti near Arequipa in the 1400s. Murúa mentions it in a short chapter on the wife of Pachacuti, who went to aid people fleeing their homes (as well as completing a number of sacrifices to huacas to stop the disaster from worsening in that area). If we could date some of these events more closely, it would be possible to slightly improve our chronology for the Inca Empire from the reigns of Pachacuti to Huayna Capac. Similar dateable phenomena could also help improve our chronology for the period of Inca expansion from the valley of Cuzco to the huge swathe of territory Tawantinsuyu later incorporated. Triangulation of various chronicles, encomienda reports, visitas, and archaeological evidence have helped with this process, but clearly much is unknown or open to debate when considering the early centuries of Inca expansion and rule. 

The omissions or unreported details mentioned by writers such as Betanzos or Sarmiento de Gamboa but absent in Murúa are the result of differences in interpretation, sources, and access. The biases of each author, their method and how they drew from earlier texts (or plagiarized them) all complicate the narratives. Consequently, even attributing blame for the civil war between Atahualpa and Huascar is complex, or even the capture of the last Inca in Vilcabamba and his execution is described differently by different types of sources. Despite these ongoing problems with verifying information and juxtaposing contradictory sources, Murúa's chronicle is a rich text with illustrations reflecting different indigenous and Spanish conceptions of the Inca past. His falling out with Guaman Poma de Ayala and how it shaped the production of their respective texts is a fascinating story, too. Indeed, even the issue of censorship and the deletion of certain lines in the chronicle by royal censors who sought to minimize some of the chronicler's harsh descriptions of the conquistadors and their greed attests to how much controlling the narrative was essential for justifying Spanish rule.