La Historia General del Perú del Inca Garcilaso de la Vega: el motivo de la traición en el archivo de la conquista del Perú

Abstract

The accounts of the conquest put on stage actors that jump the regulatory limits to become threatening figures, as the traitor, that is, the rebel to the king. But the traitor can be an ambiguous figure; in such a way the Inca Garcilaso treats the theme in the Historia General del Perú, particularly with the representation of Gonzalo Pizarro. This work analizes the way the Inca reviews the topic of betrayal, and particularly, how he reverses the image of three “infamous”, according to other historians: Gonzalo Pizarro, his “maese de campo”, Francisco de Carvajal and his own father, Garcilaso de la Vega Vargas. I approach the betrayal from different angles in the text and suggest that there is a fallacy in the opposition between loyalists and traitors. I also embark on the search for a strategy to reconsider the dualisms and polarities with which the colonial discourse formulated stigmas and stereotypes, both on the side of the conquered and of the conquerors. The Historia General opens a fissure in the archive of the conquest of
Peru, with a disruptive and politically inconvenient gesture.