ABSTRACT
The landscape, the distances, and the silence of Peru seem oppressive to visitors. It is certain that Peruvians have felt the effects of their environment, but this has not prevented them from developing a history that can be described, without exaggeration, as troubled or even tempestuous. The country's history may be divided into pre-colonial, colonial, independence, and national periods. Legend also surrounds the origin of the Incas, the people who, by the time of the arrival of the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, dominated the survivors of all the other tribes. In 1502, about ten years after the first voyage of Christopher Columbus, the Spaniards established themselves in Tierra Firme, as they named the point at which the Isthmus of Panama meets South America. They improvised little cities, which were sometimes besieged by the Indians, and organized expeditions of discovery, conquest, and trade. The Spanish colonies were organized in viceroyships: that of New Spain and that of New Castile.
