Gonzalo Pizarro

Timeline

1. 1532–1540Cusco / Quito · South AmericaGonzalo accompanied his brother Francisco in the conquest of the Inca Empire and distinguished himself in several battles. After the conquest he was appointed to administer the Quito region (modern Ecuador), establishing colonial rule there and suppressing Inca resistance.
2. 1541–1542Quito / upper Amazon River · South AmericaIn February 1541 Gonzalo led some 220 Spanish soldiers and several thousand indigenous auxiliaries out of Quito, crossing the Andes into the Amazon rainforest in search of the wealth and cinnamon lands of El Dorado legend. Tormented by hunger and disease, he dispatched Orellana with a small party by boat to seek food; Orellana never returned, drifting downstream to the Atlantic. Gonzalo led the main force on a grueling retreat, returning to Quito in June 1542 with only about 80 men, empty-handed.
3. 1544–1548Lima · South AmericaIn 1542 Spain issued the New Laws, intending to abolish the encomienda system and curtail the conquerors' privileges. Gonzalo joined with colonial nobles to launch a rebellion, killing the royal envoy Núñez de Vela at the Battle of Incaquito in 1546 and becoming the de facto ruler of Peru. However, the Crown dispatched the new envoy La Gasca, whose policy of pardons disintegrated the rebel forces; in April 1548 Gonzalo was defeated and captured at the Battle of Sacsayhuaman and executed for treason the same day.