El 15 de noviembre de 1532 marcó un hito crucial en la historia de América y el Imperio Inca, cuando 168 conquistadores españoles llegaron a Cajamarca, una de las ciudades sagradas del Perú. A pesar de estar en desventaja numérica y enfrentarse a 80.000 guerreros incas, estos españoles lograron dar un giro inesperado a la situación. En tan solo 24 horas, más de 7.000 incas perdieron la vida, y el emperador inca fue capturado y encadenado, dando inicio a un periodo de dominación española que transformaría radicalmente el continente.
Este evento no solo resalta las estrategias de los conquistadores, sino también la resistencia y organización de las fuerzas incas. La batalla de Cajamarca representa un conflicto emblemático que simboliza el choque de civilizaciones y la llegada de un nuevo orden colonial. La combinación de la tecnología militar europea, como las armas de fuego y los caballos, junto con la desunión entre las diferentes etnias incas, facilitó esta sorprendente victoria.
La caída del Imperio Inca es un recordatorio del impacto devastador de la colonización europea en América. Este acontecimiento histórico ha sido objeto de numerosos estudios y debates sobre su significado y consecuencias. Si deseas profundizar en la historia de Cajamarca y su relevancia en la colonización, este video ofrece una perspectiva educativa y fascinante.
**Hashtags:** #HistoriaDeCajamarca, #ImperioInca, #ConquistaEspañola
**Keywords:** Cajamarca, Imperio Inca, conquista española, historia de Perú, batalla de Cajamarca, colonización, estrategias militares, resistencia inca, caía del imperio, impacto de la colonización.
Este evento no solo resalta las estrategias de los conquistadores, sino también la resistencia y organización de las fuerzas incas. La batalla de Cajamarca representa un conflicto emblemático que simboliza el choque de civilizaciones y la llegada de un nuevo orden colonial. La combinación de la tecnología militar europea, como las armas de fuego y los caballos, junto con la desunión entre las diferentes etnias incas, facilitó esta sorprendente victoria.
La caída del Imperio Inca es un recordatorio del impacto devastador de la colonización europea en América. Este acontecimiento histórico ha sido objeto de numerosos estudios y debates sobre su significado y consecuencias. Si deseas profundizar en la historia de Cajamarca y su relevancia en la colonización, este video ofrece una perspectiva educativa y fascinante.
**Hashtags:** #HistoriaDeCajamarca, #ImperioInca, #ConquistaEspañola
**Keywords:** Cajamarca, Imperio Inca, conquista española, historia de Perú, batalla de Cajamarca, colonización, estrategias militares, resistencia inca, caía del imperio, impacto de la colonización.
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00:00A day in November, 1532, the New and the Old World collided.
00:20168 Spaniards attacked the imperial army of the Incas in the highlands of Peru.
00:27And before the end of the day, they had massacred 7,000 people to take control of that empire.
00:36Not a single Spaniard lost his life in the process.
00:43Why was the balance of power between the New and the Old World so unbalanced?
00:49And why, in the centuries that followed, were the Europeans who conquered so many parts of the planet?
00:57These questions fascinate Professor Jared Diamond.
01:02This man has started an investigation to find out the origins of power.
01:08And to achieve his goal, he is looking for clues in the most unusual places.
01:14Diamond has developed a very original theory.
01:18He argues that what separates the winners from the losers is the land, the geography.
01:28It was the shape of the continents and their crops and animals that allowed certain cultures to flourish, while others lagged behind.
01:38But does this way of seeing the world shed any light on the events of 1532?
01:49How does geography explain the conquest of the planet through weapons, germs and steel?
02:07WEAPONS, GERMS AND STEEL
02:18Weapons, Germs and Steel. The Conquest.
02:37CONQUEST
02:46A group of Spanish conquerors spent two years traveling in search of gold and glory.
02:55They were not professional soldiers, but mercenaries and adventurers led by a retired army captain named Francisco Pizarro.
03:07After amassing a fortune in the colonies of Central America, Pizarro and his men headed south and entered an unknown territory.
03:19They were the first Europeans to climb the Andes and settled in the South American continent.
03:25In their advance, they found evidence of the existence of a great native civilization.
03:31They had reached the limits of the powerful Inca Empire.
03:41That encounter was the beginning of a new era in the history of the world.
03:46The Inca Empire.
03:54That encounter was, for both the Indians and the Spaniards, a clash of cultures.
04:02The Indians had never seen a white man before and had no idea of the threat he posed.
04:08They did not imagine that in a matter of days those foreigners would devastate their world.
04:26In the 1530s, the Inca Empire was huge.
04:30It covered an area of 4,000 km that extended along the Andes from the current Ecuador to the center of Chile.
04:41But only 800 km north began the colonies of Central America and the Caribbean, valuable possessions of the Spanish Empire.
04:54At that time, the king of Spain controlled a third of continental Europe.
04:59But the truth is that not long ago, Spain itself had become a unified state after seven centuries of fighting the Islamic occupation.
05:15Spain was still a rural society.
05:18Most of the conquerors came from villages and small towns like Trujillo, where Pizarro grew up.
05:28Francisco Pizarro spent much of his childhood here, working as a porter in the surrounding fields.
05:38Today he is remembered as a great warrior.
05:42His statue dominates the central square of Trujillo and his family's house has become a museum.
05:49Jared Diamond has come here to delve into the world of the conquerors in order to understand the secret of their success.
06:08This is Francisco Pizarro, a Spanish conqueror of the most powerful state in the New World.
06:14The Inca Empire.
06:16But why did Pizarro and his men become the Incas and not the Arabs?
06:21It seems like a simple question, but the answer is not so obvious.
06:26After all, Pizarro started out as an ordinary person, and Trujillo is a fairly normal population.
06:34So where did this man and his subordinates get such great power?
06:39You may wonder why I am so interested in the conquerors of Pizarro.
06:45The reason is that their history is a sadly perfect example of European conquest.
06:52And I have been studying the guidelines of the conquests for 30 years.
06:58I have been studying the history of the conquests for 30 years.
07:01And I have been studying the guidelines of the conquests for 30 years.
07:08Jared Diamond works as a professor at the University of Los Angeles,
07:12but he has done most of his fieldwork in Papua New Guinea.
07:23The time he spent there gave him the idea of exploring the roots of the Inca civilization.
07:28The time he spent there gave him the idea of exploring the roots of the Inca civilization.
07:34In order to try to understand why some peoples have managed to dominate and conquer others.
07:47Diamond maintains that thousands of years ago,
07:50the ability to work the land gave certain cultures a huge advantage.
07:55And that those who had the fortune of having the most productive crops and animals,
08:00became the most fruitful farmers.
08:05Agriculture began to develop in an area of the Middle East,
08:09known as the Fertile Crescent.
08:12Over time, the crops and animals of that region spread through North Africa and Europe,
08:18where they gave rise to an explosion of civilization.
08:25The Fertile Crescent
08:46In the 16th century, in European farms,
08:50the breeding animals of the Fertile Crescent were predominant.
08:54None were native to Europe.
09:01From them, man obtained meat, but also milk, wool, leather and manure.
09:07And the most important thing is that those beings were able to develop great strength.
09:13A horse or a ox could transform the productivity of the farmlands.
09:25This allowed European farmers to grow more food to supply more people,
09:30who, in turn, could build larger and more complex societies.
09:43In the New World, there were no horses or breeding animals
09:47suitable for collaborating in agricultural cultivation.
09:50All the work had to be done by hand.
09:53The only large domestic animal was the llama,
09:57but those docile creatures have never been given a harness.
10:03The Incas had a special ability to grow potatoes and corn.
10:07However, given their geographical location,
10:09they were not as productive as European farmers.
10:17The fact that horses could be mounted
10:20gave the Europeans another important advantage.
10:28For the Incas, the vision of the conquerors of Pizarro
10:31crossing their lands must have been something extraordinary.
10:40They had never seen a person riding an animal before,
10:44so they thought that those strange-looking men,
10:48half-humans, half-beasts, were gods.
10:52The horses that impacted the Incas so much
10:55had been in use in Spain for 4,000 years.
11:01And in an era prior to motor transport,
11:04they allowed people to move,
11:07and they were able to carry heavy loads.
11:22And control their territories.
11:45When Javier Martín is not gathering the cattle with his horse,
11:48he offers exhibitions in the traditional riding style.
11:54This riding style is called jineta,
11:57and is based on the control and mobility of the animal.
12:01It involves carrying the knees bent and glued to the sides of the horse,
12:06and holding the reins with one hand.
12:10It is a totally different style from medieval knights,
12:14much more formal.
12:18In the 16th century, the jineta style
12:21was already the most used by the Spanish knights.
12:27And surely this is how the conquerors mounted their horses.
12:36To see how a person controls such a large animal with such precision,
12:40making it stop, starting and turning again,
12:44is an extraordinary spectacle.
12:46Javier has told me that he has been riding since he was five years old,
12:50and after looking at this exhibition,
12:53he understands better the origins of the conquerors.
12:56They mastered these techniques to perfection,
12:59and although they were learned to work with bulls,
13:02they were also very useful in the military.
13:05The control they exerted over the animals was such
13:08that it is not difficult to imagine them running over their rivals in the open spaces.
13:12The scene must have been explosive
13:14for all those who had never seen a horse.
13:17Surely they caused amazement and terror among their opponents,
13:21before even throwing themselves at them to run over them,
13:24nail their spears and kill them.
13:32A royal messenger brought the news of the arrival of foreigners
13:36with the appearance of gods mounted on four-legged animals
13:40to the emperor of the Incas,
13:42who was camping in the valley of Cajamarca, north of Peru,
13:46guarded by an army of 80,000 men.
13:55Atahualpa was revered as a living god,
13:58a son of the sun itself.
14:05And he was in Cajamarca,
14:08performing a religious retreat,
14:10to make a series of military triumphs,
14:13recently harvested.
14:22When the advance of the Spaniards was communicated to him,
14:25instead of ordering his death, he sent them a message.
14:36He invited them to meet him in Cajamarca as soon as possible.
14:41Atahualpa wanted the Spaniards to fall into a trap when they came to Cajamarca.
14:53And to make sure it was so,
14:56he started a kind of psychological game with them,
14:59sending them presents so that they would agree to meet him.
15:06Atahualpa knew that the Spaniards were not gods.
15:11In intelligence reports,
15:14it is mentioned that those people wore a face covered in wool,
15:17or something similar, like lambs or alpacas.
15:20They describe them as animals.
15:23It is also said that they went from one place to another with a kind of bowl,
15:26which had never been used to cook, at the top of the head.
15:32You have to be crazy to walk around with a bowl on your head.
15:36But of course, it is even worse not to use it to cook.
15:40When they arrived at a camp,
15:43Atahualpa thought that those beings were subhumans.
15:49And what could a couple of horsemen and hundreds of Spaniards do
15:52against the powerful Inca Empire?
15:55In theory, nothing.
16:01But Atahualpa's spies did not repair
16:04that the Spaniards possessed some of the best weapons in the world.
16:11At the time of the conquistadors,
16:14Spain had the largest army in Europe,
16:17led from the capital of the empire, Toledo.
16:24The Spaniards had been at war with the Muslims for more than 700 years,
16:28and with other European armies.
16:40In the old continent, an armament race was held,
16:44and to survive, they had to stay at the forefront of armament technology.
16:55In the 1530s, the bow was a very important element of the Spanish arsenal.
17:02The gunpowder was invented in China,
17:05but it was the Arabs who began to use it as a weapon.
17:10In European hands, the weapons became lighter and easier to transport,
17:15and for the first time, they were used by infantry soldiers in the battlefield.
17:24The bow was still a fairly rudimentary instrument,
17:28despite which it would change the face of the war.
17:31Probably to those of us who live in the modern era,
17:34it seems to us that this weapon was useless,
17:36that it was like a lie.
17:38It was very difficult to hit the target with it and reload it,
17:41it was a fairly long process,
17:43so much so that while the shooter was preparing it for a new shot,
17:46a swordsman could come from behind and kill him.
17:49However, the Incas had not even reached this point,
17:52so a weapon like this, with its sound, its smell and all that smoke,
17:55would surely terrify anyone who had not seen something like this before.
17:59It must have been exciting and scary, like 1532.
18:06But it was not.
18:21Despite its spectacularity, the technology of gunpowder
18:24was still taking its first steps.
18:27The true power of the conquerors
18:30was in another aspect, specifically in the production of steel.
18:36In Toledo there were some of the best sword makers in the world.
18:41But why were they able to create such steel weapons,
18:45while the Incas only had simple bronze instruments?
18:54The Europeans had no innate quality,
18:57especially brilliant,
18:59that would justify that they were the only ones able to create high-quality swords.
19:07Like firearms,
19:09swords were the result of a long process of trial and error,
19:13which began 7,000 years ago outside of Europe,
19:16in the Fertile Crescent, to be more exact.
19:22That was where the human being began to work with metal.
19:26Due to the geographical proximity,
19:29the Europeans inherited this technology
19:32and raised it to new levels,
19:33supported by the demands of the European soldiers,
19:36who required more solid, long and sharp swords.
19:46This is a Toledan sword once finished.
19:49This particular one is a reproduction of the one that Pizarro carried,
19:52and it's a fearsome weapon.
19:54It's a fierce weapon.
19:56They would stab the enemies, and it's also a slash,
19:59and it's one stand,
20:00so it could kill a dozen people within a short time.
20:08Swords like this,
20:10which are called rope swords,
20:12were a culmination of a technology of extremely sophisticated metal.
20:16You think about what qualities a sword must have.
20:19First of all, it has to be hard enough.
20:22Metal has to be hard enough to take a sharp edge,
20:25and that's where steel is needed,
20:27which is an alloy of iron and carbon.
20:30The greater the content of carbon in the iron,
20:33the harder the steel will be.
20:35But an excessively resistant material
20:37is also more brittle,
20:39which is not good because when hitting someone with a sword,
20:42it could break.
20:44In addition, the blade must have some flexibility.
20:46It must be able to bend and regain its shape,
20:50and that is achieved by heating it to certain temperatures,
20:53then immersing it in water.
20:54It took many centuries of endless experiments
20:57to get to the level of sophistication
20:59that would allow for such a long, elegant, fine and lethal weapon
21:03as the rope sword.
21:12At first, this type of very long-blade sword
21:15was created as a duel weapon,
21:17but it became very fashionable in the Europe of the Renaissance.
21:20It was the artifact chosen by all the great swordsmen.
21:24The word rope sword has its origins in Spain,
21:27and it was precisely there where, for the first time,
21:30people began to see swords with everyday clothes,
21:33with civilian clothes,
21:35in their daily occupations.
21:37In the Middle Ages, they were not used to doing it.
21:40It was a practice that began in the 16th century.
21:43For men, it was a form of self-affirmation.
21:46Carrying the weapon, they made it clear that they were great gentlemen,
21:50that they were great warriors,
21:51carrying the weapon, they made it clear that they were great gentlemen,
21:54and that they were ascending in society,
21:56and they claimed their belonging to the lineage of the knights of the Middle Ages.
22:00The sword was largely a symbol of the desire for power
22:04of the aspiring conquerors.
22:06What drove them to overcome all kinds of penalties,
22:10what pushed them to leave for America,
22:12was their greed,
22:14their desire to find gold,
22:16and their desire to progress.
22:18And the rope sword symbolized the perfection
22:21of the very avarice.
22:31On November 15, 1532,
22:34the group of adventurers, led by Pizarro,
22:37entered the valley of Cajamarca.
22:44They had been told that Atahualpa was waiting for them there,
22:47but they were not prepared for the welcome
22:49that the Incas gave them.
22:55In the hills located behind the city of Cajamarca,
22:58was the imperial army,
23:0080,000 men in combat formation.
23:10In their diaries, the conquerors themselves
23:13left evidence of their first impressions.
23:19Their camp looked like a beautiful city.
23:22Until then, we had not seen anything similar in the Indies,
23:26and we were scared because we were very few,
23:29and we had gone deep into those lands.
23:37Pizarro sent a game formed by his best riders
23:41to the heart of the Inca camp.
23:45The march opened to the captain of Soto.
23:50Ignoring if Atahualpa would allow them to cross the camp
23:54without causing them any harm,
23:57but they decided to take the risk and go to meet them.
24:04The visit of Soto had an important psychological purpose.
24:09Intimidate the Inca ruler in front of his own people.
24:13Challenge him with the horse.
24:19At first, Atahualpa did not react to the presence of Soto.
24:23He acted as if there was no one there.
24:28When the horse was placed in front of the Inca,
24:31he did not even move,
24:34thus demonstrating that the animal
24:37was not impressed by the slightest thing,
24:40and throwing to the ground the plans of the captain.
24:43Atahualpa, the captain of Soto,
24:45and throwing to the ground the plans of the captain.
24:50From Soto this situation advanced so close to him
24:53that the air that expelled the horse through the hollars
24:55moved the fringes of the adornment that the Inca shone on his forehead.
24:58But he did not move.
25:05After a few moments,
25:07after a brief silence,
25:09Atahualpa shouted.
25:16He told them that the time had come to pay for what they had done.
25:22I guess he shouted that it was going to cost them their lives.
25:39As is logical, Soto was very nervous,
25:42and returned terrified to the camp.
25:46From what we know,
25:48the Spaniards spent the night before terrified by the panic.
26:03The conquerors had established their camp in the city of Cajamarca,
26:07and by then,
26:09almost everyone was convinced
26:11that they would never hear from them again.
26:13After all,
26:15there were only 168 soldiers,
26:171,600 kilometers from any compatriot,
26:20facing an army made up of 80,000 Incas.
26:25Few of us could sleep that night.
26:28We spent hours walking through the square
26:31from which we saw the bonfires of the Indian army camp.
26:34It was a terrifying image.
26:36It looked like a starry night.
26:44Pizarro and the officers he trusted the most
26:47debated their options to face Atahualpa.
26:54Some advised prudence,
26:56but Pizarro insisted that his best chance
26:59was to launch a surprise attack the next day.
27:02That tactic had always worked successfully in the past.
27:10Twelve years before Pizarro arrived in Peru,
27:13another famous conqueror, Hernán Cortés,
27:16entered Mexico and discovered an extraordinary civilization,
27:20the Aztec.
27:24Cortés conquered the country,
27:26kidnapping the leader of that people
27:28and taking advantage of the subsequent chaos.
27:31The story of Hernán Cortés was published some time later.
27:34The book received great acceptance
27:37and became an essential manual
27:39for any aspirant to conquer.
27:41The book is still kept in the magnificent library
27:44of the University of Salamanca in Spain.
27:53This wonderful library
27:55could be considered, among other things,
27:58a treasure trove of strategies,
28:00because in these books
28:02it is narrated what certain generals did to others
28:05for thousands of years in the past
28:07and throughout Eurasia.
28:11Here, in this library,
28:13we have a famous story of the conquest of Mexico
28:16in which all the tactics
28:18that Cortés successfully deployed
28:20in his confrontation with the Aztecs are detailed.
28:23Pizarro took them as a reference
28:25to know how to act with the Incas.
28:27These, on the other hand,
28:29were transmitted in oral knowledge.
28:31The Incas were quite naive
28:33and lacked all sophistication
28:35due to the lack of a written tradition.
28:42But if the books were so useful,
28:44why didn't they know how to read or write the Incas?
28:53The creation of a new system
28:55of independent writing
28:57is an extremely complex process
28:59that has taken place on rare occasions
29:01in human history.
29:03The first to succeed in culminating it
29:05was the Sumerian people
29:07in the Fertile Crescent,
29:09at least 5,000 years ago.
29:11They developed an elaborate system of symbols
29:13that received the name
29:15of cuneiform writing
29:17and whose purpose, possibly,
29:19was to register agricultural transactions.
29:21Since then,
29:23almost all other written languages
29:25in Europe and Asia
29:27have copied, adapted
29:29or simply taken as a reference
29:31the foundations of the cuneiform system.
29:35The diffusion of writing
29:37was largely contributed
29:39by the invention of paper,
29:41a type of ink
29:43that was used to write
29:45and to write on paper.
29:47All these innovations
29:49emerged outside of Europe,
29:51but the inhabitants of the Old Continent
29:53adopted them in the Middle Ages
29:55to create the most extraordinary vehicle
29:57for the transmission of knowledge,
29:59the printing press.
30:06From then on,
30:08the word written
30:09began to spread at full speed
30:11and with great precision
30:13throughout Europe and Asia.
30:15The modern world
30:17would not have become
30:19what it is without writing.
30:24But in another corner of the world
30:26a new writing system
30:28was independently invented.
30:32At least 2,500 years ago,
30:34in southern Mexico,
30:36the native peoples
30:37developed a way of working with symbols
30:39that would later lead
30:41to the Mayan writing.
30:44But if the Mayans knew how to write,
30:46why did they not spread their knowledge
30:48to the south of the Andes
30:50and help the Incas to cultivate?
30:56In the opinion of Diamond,
30:58the explanation lies
31:00in the shape of the continents.
31:05Here are Europe
31:07and Asia,
31:09which formed Eurasia,
31:11a gigantic continent from east to west
31:13and narrower from north to south.
31:16The American continent,
31:18on the other hand,
31:20has a longer shape,
31:22it goes from north to south
31:24and its dimensions are narrower
31:26from east to west,
31:28especially in Panama,
31:30where it is less than 160 km wide.
31:32The two continents
31:34have the same length,
31:35but Eurasia extends
31:37from east to west
31:39and America from north to south.
31:41It is as if one had rotated 90 degrees
31:43with respect to the other.
31:47Diamond has already shown
31:49that crops and animals
31:51expanded without problems
31:53to the east and west
31:55throughout Eurasia.
31:57And it is that in places
31:59located in the same latitude
32:01the days last the same
32:03and the climate and vegetation
32:06are different.
32:08But in the American continent
32:10the opposite happened.
32:12Going from one end to the other
32:14implied traveling from north to south,
32:16going through regions
32:18in which the days
32:20have a different duration,
32:22with different climatic areas
32:24and a different vegetation.
32:30These basic differences
32:32prevented the projection
32:33of crops, animals,
32:35people, ideas and technologies.
32:42The inhabitants of the Andes
32:44suffered from chronic isolation.
32:46They had no access to writing
32:48and many other innovations
32:50from the rest of the continent.
32:53Instead, Pizarro and his men
32:55enjoyed a geographical blessing.
32:59As Spaniards,
33:01they took advantage of all the benefits
33:03of the technologies and ideas
33:05that had been transmitted
33:07without problems by Eurasia.
33:13In the events of 1532
33:15very profound causes influenced
33:17on which neither the Spaniards
33:19nor the Incas had any control.
33:25The shape of the continents,
33:27the distribution of plants and animals
33:30and the dissemination of Eurasia technology
33:32were facts that depended on geography.
33:36And in almost all the episodes
33:38of this story,
33:40geography leaned in favor of the Europeans.
34:02In the 19th century,
34:04the European Union
34:06declared a state of emergency
34:08in order to prevent
34:10the spread of Eurasia.
34:12The European Union
34:14decided to stop
34:16the spread of Eurasia
34:18in order to prevent
34:20the spread of Eurasia
34:22in order to prevent
34:24the spread of Eurasia
34:26in order to prevent
34:28the spread of Eurasia
34:30on November 16, 1532.
34:37Atahualpa had agreed
34:39to meet the Spaniards
34:41that morning in the city of Cajamarca.
34:47His entourage preceded him.
34:50However, he made a fatal decision.
34:53He ordered his soldiers
34:55to be disarmed.
34:59The Indians were musicians and dancers.
35:01They were soldiers,
35:03but without weapons.
35:05Why did Atahualpa disarm
35:07his own soldiers?
35:09Because that was a happy day,
35:11a day of celebration.
35:13The ruler did not go to war
35:15but to a party.
35:17His goal was
35:19that all the people
35:21saw how those supposed gods
35:23were fleeing terrified.
35:25The fact that some people
35:27believed that the Spaniards
35:29were gods
35:31was very convenient
35:33for Atahualpa's interests.
35:35He knew it was not true,
35:37but if the people thought
35:39that he had defeated
35:41some deities,
35:43he would be with him.
35:45And if he also defeated
35:47the Spaniards
35:49without showing any strength,
35:51his subjects would consider him
35:52a traitor.
36:04Atahualpa and his men
36:06entered Cajamarca.
36:08The Spaniards were waiting for them.
36:13There were five or six thousand men
36:15and behind them
36:17appeared the figure of Atahualpa.
36:19The ruler was sitting
36:20in a luxurious litter
36:22adorned with feathers,
36:24gold and silver.
36:26Many of us urinated
36:28over how scared we were.
36:35The men of Atahualpa
36:37occupied the entire square,
36:39but there was not a single
36:41Spaniard in sight.
36:46The sovereign Inca asked,
36:48Where are these dogs?
36:50One of his trusted officers
36:52replied,
36:54They have run away
36:56because they are afraid
36:58of the Inca magnificence.
37:00As expected,
37:02the crowd heard those words
37:04and believed them to be true.
37:09Then Pizarro ordered
37:11his priest
37:13to confront Atahualpa.
37:15The conquerors were forced
37:17to try to convert
37:18the native peoples
37:20before resorting to violence.
37:37My power
37:39comes from my lord.
37:41His words are written
37:43in this book.
37:49What do you want?
37:53Atahualpa had never seen a book
37:55and did not know what to do with it.
38:02What do you want?
38:04I am the king of the Inca.
38:07I am the king of the Inca.
38:13How dare you, Indian dog?
38:15Get out of Spain
38:16Get out of Spain
38:18Destroy these dogs
38:20who do not respect the things of God.
38:22Santiago, them!
38:29Then,
38:31with the crowd
38:33totally unprepared,
38:35the horses appeared
38:37and panicked.
38:46Just imagine the scene
38:48that took place in Cajamarca.
38:50The Incas had never seen horses before
38:52and those who carried the conquerors
38:54were not ordinary normal horses
38:56but great and fierce Spanish fighting horses.
38:58The animals took a step
39:00among those present,
39:02stomped them and became
39:04an extraordinary platform for the fight.
39:06From their mount, the Spaniards
39:08could handle the sword
39:10with their left and right hands
39:12and cut, stab and cut
39:14everything that was around them.
39:16If they had known
39:18that in front of the cavalry
39:20it is best to remain firm,
39:22they would have imposed themselves on their attackers
39:24because they were much superior in number
39:26but they ignored it
39:28and began to flee in a disordered way
39:30under the circumstance
39:32that they took advantage of the riders
39:34to mix with them
39:36and kill them with their swords.
39:38There was an Inca god
39:40called Viracocha.
39:42He was the god of thunder
39:44and was represented as a white man
39:46with his arquebuses
39:48the very incarnation of Viracocha.
39:59The Atahualpa Inca
40:01continued sitting on the litter
40:03that his lords held.
40:06As soon as they could
40:08the Spaniards went after him
40:10and they started to kill the carriers.
40:14But if one fell
40:16another replaced him.
40:23Only when that tragedy
40:25was about to reach its end
40:27the chair began to shake
40:29because there were no more carriers left.
40:40When the litter fell
40:42Pizarro himself captured Atahualpa.
40:46His plan had worked perfectly.
41:00The conquerors transferred the Inca ruler
41:03to an improvised prison
41:05in the royal dependencies of Cajamarca.
41:08He thought we were going to kill him
41:10but we got him out of his mistake
41:12because Christians can only kill
41:14in the heat of battle.
41:17Atahualpa Inca
41:28Outside there were thousands of dead Incas.
41:33The rest of the army retreated to the hills.
41:39Despite the great difference in numbers
41:41the horses, the swords
41:43and the strategy of the Spaniards
41:44were decisive.
41:51In addition, although they ignored it
41:54the conquerors had another weapon
41:56an invisible weapon of massive destruction
41:59that had preceded them.
42:08Today the war against infectious diseases
42:11is fought in biological research centers
42:14like the one in Porton Down
42:16in southern England.
42:19Vaccines are produced there
42:21against the deadliest viruses in the world.
42:28But in the 16th century
42:30there were no vaccines or protection
42:32against the rapid spread of infectious diseases.
42:35Twelve years before Pizarro arrived in Cajamarca
42:38a Spanish ship arrived in Mexico.
42:48One of the slaves on board
42:50had the initial symptoms of a fever.
43:05He was the first person
43:07who brought a lethal disease
43:09to the American continent.
43:11That disease was the smallpox.
43:17In several weeks
43:19the smallpox virus spread from a single source
43:21infecting thousands of American natives.
43:25Smallpox is introduced in the body
43:27when the person breathes the particles of the virus.
43:30These are installed in the back of the throat
43:32and inside the lungs.
43:34About two to three days after the infection
43:36the classic smallpox appears.
43:38In the most serious cases
43:40the whole body is covered with granites
43:42which later become huge blisters.
43:46In the end, those classic smallpox lesions
43:48invade the entire skin
43:50starting with the hands and the face.
43:57From that time on
43:59the patient enters a highly infectious phase
44:00because in the blisters
44:02there are endless particles of the smallpox
44:04and if those blisters open
44:06the liquid inside
44:08transmits the virus to everything it touches.
44:19Ten or twelve days later
44:21his friends would get sick
44:23and ten or twelve days later
44:25his friends' friends would get sick
44:27so the rate of spread is exponential.
44:30Its rate of infection
44:32would grow rapidly
44:34and its effects on the population
44:36would be devastating.
44:44The first smallpox epidemic in the New World
44:47spread through Central America
44:49and reached the Inca Empire.
44:54Wherever it went
44:56the virus decimated the native populations
44:57making the business even easier
44:59for the Spanish conquistadors.
45:06But why did the germans
45:08only attack one side?
45:11Why did the Spanish
45:13transmit their diseases to the Incas
45:15and not the other way around?
45:23What you see here
45:25was Pizarro's secret weapon.
45:27Pigs and cows.
45:29Sheep and goats.
45:31In short, domestic animals.
45:33Remember that Pizarro
45:35was a porker.
45:37He grew up in huts like this
45:39and lived in close contact
45:41with domestic animals
45:43breathing their germs
45:45and drinking their milk.
45:47From these germs
45:49the diseases that cause the most damage
45:51to humans evolved.
45:53For example, our flu
45:55which is caused by a disease
45:57called smallpox.
45:59Those creatures
46:01transmitted smallpox
46:03so the worst killer of humans
46:05was actually the 10,000 year legacy
46:07of close contact
46:09with our beloved domestic animals.
46:14During the Middle Ages
46:16infectious diseases
46:18spread throughout Europe
46:20and claimed millions of lives.
46:25But paradoxically
46:27the repeated epidemics
46:29increased the resistance of Europeans.
46:33In each new outbreak
46:35there was always someone
46:37genetically more capable
46:39to fight the virus.
46:42Those people had more
46:44chances of surviving
46:46and by having children
46:48they transmitted their genetic resistance.
46:53Over the centuries
46:55entire populations
46:57were protected
46:59from the spread of diseases
47:01such as smallpox
47:03a protection that the Incas
47:05never had.
47:08When smallpox came to the New World
47:10no one had ever seen
47:12a disease like this
47:14so the number of susceptible people
47:16to be affected was much higher.
47:18In addition there was no natural immunity
47:20so the number of infected
47:22and transmitting people
47:24would also be noticeably higher
47:26The percentage of deaths
47:28and possible sick people
47:30experienced a pronounced increase.
47:32The disease spread rapidly
47:34among the population
47:36and caused many deaths.
47:42Why, until then,
47:44had the Native Americans
47:46never seen their faces
47:48with smallpox?
47:50And why did they not have
47:52their own diseases
47:53such as smallpox?
47:55Simply because
47:57they had not lived
47:59the same history
48:01of contact with farm animals.
48:03The Incas had flames
48:05but those creatures
48:07are not like the cows
48:09and European sheep.
48:11They are not milked
48:13they do not form large herds
48:15and they do not live in stables
48:17and sheds with humans.
48:19For this reason
48:21between the flames
48:23and the animals
48:25there was no contact.
48:27The key to the Diamond argument
48:29is the distribution
48:31of domesticated animals
48:33around the world.
48:35Apart from the flame
48:37large farm animals
48:39were native to Eurasia
48:41and North Africa.
48:43In North America,
48:45Sub-Saharan Africa
48:47or Australia
48:49no animal was ever domesticated.
48:50These epidemics
48:52also have their origins
48:54in Eurasia and North Africa
48:56from where they spread
48:58around the world
49:00with lethal effects.
49:05The number of indigenous people
49:07who died during
49:09the Spanish conquest
49:11of the New World
49:13is a question
49:15that has aroused
49:17a great debate.
49:18There are more than 20 million natives
49:20of which the vast majority
49:22maybe 95%
49:24died from diseases
49:26that came from the Old World.
49:28A continent lost
49:30almost all of its inhabitants.
49:41After delivering
49:4320 tons of gold and silver
49:45to their captors
49:46it was no longer useful for them.
49:59They executed him with a stick
50:01in the same square
50:03where so many of his followers
50:05were killed 8 months earlier.
50:13With Atahualpa dead
50:14the conquistadors
50:16launched the colonization
50:18of the rest of Peru
50:20trusting in the power
50:22of their weapons,
50:24germs and steel.
50:32The gold from the Spanish colonies
50:34was sent to Seville
50:36in the south of Spain.
50:39Today in the Guadalquivir river
50:41there is not much activity
50:42but in the 16th century
50:44this was one of the most
50:46crowded and important ports
50:48in the world.
50:50A constant flow of ships
50:52transporting treasures
50:54from the Americas
50:56helped Spain to become
50:58one of the richest nations
51:00on earth.
51:02The conquistadors
51:04changed forever the relationship
51:06between the New World
51:08and the Old World.
51:10I came to Spain
51:12with a question
51:14why did Pizarro and his men
51:16conquer the Incas
51:18and not the other way around?
51:20There is a whole myth
51:22about this process of conquest
51:24according to which
51:26the European expansion
51:28was the result of the great
51:30bravery, wisdom,
51:32intelligence and ingenuity
51:34of the Europeans
51:36although the truth
51:38is that it had nothing to do
51:40with the personal qualities
51:42due to its geographical location
51:44and history
51:46they were the first to develop
51:48weapons, germs and steel.
51:54At the end of the 19th century
51:56the European powers
51:58had left behind
52:00the American continent
52:02and colonized Africa,
52:04Australia and much of Asia.
52:08The process that began
52:10in Cajamarca
52:12led to its logical conclusion
52:18the weapons, germs
52:20and steel of the Europeans
52:22were remodeling the world.