The story
On November 4, 1780, Jose Gabriel Condorcanqui, a wealthy Indigenous chief (kuraka) and mule-train owner from Tinta near Cusco, seized the Spanish district governor Antonio de Arriaga, put him on trial and had him executed. Taking the name Tupac Amaru II, after the last Inca ruler executed by the Spanish in 1572, he called for an end to abusive officials and forced labor. His forces defeated a Spanish army at Sangarara and grew to tens of thousands, but failed to take Cusco. His wife, Micaela Bastidas, was a key strategist and organizer.
The revolt drew on grievances that had grown under the Bourbon reforms, which raised sales taxes and tightened collection, on the hated reparto, the forced sale of goods to Indigenous communities, and on the mita labor draft for the silver mines. Spain's costly war against Britain, which it entered in 1779 during the American Revolution, raised fiscal pressure further. Tupac Amaru II invoked Inca legitimacy while still professing loyalty to the king.
Betrayed and captured in April 1781, he was publicly executed in Cusco on May 18, along with Bastidas and other family members. The rebellion continued: in Upper Peru (modern Bolivia), Tupac Katari besieged La Paz for months in 1781. The fighting killed an estimated 100,000 people. Spain then abolished the reparto, stripped many Indigenous nobles of their posts, and banned Inca dress, titles and symbols.
Why it mattered
- Spain abolished the forced sale of goods and reorganized local government in Peru, creating new administrative districts.
- Fear of Indigenous uprisings made Creole elites in Peru cautious about independence, delaying it until outside armies arrived in the 1820s.
- Tupac Amaru II became a lasting symbol of resistance, adopted by Peru's 1968 military government and by movements across Latin America.
Sources
- Túpac Amaru II Britannica
- Tupac Amaru II EBSCO Research Starters
Community notes
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