Promaucae people
Nation | Defunct
1396 CE to 1683 CE
Promaucaes, also spelled as Promaucas or Purumaucas (quechua purum awqa: wild people), are an indigenous pre-Columbian Mapuche tribal group that lives in the present territory of Chile, south of the Maipo River basin of Santiago, Chile and the Itata River.
Those to the north are called Quillotanes and Mapochoes by the Spanish colonists).
They speak Mapudungun, like the Moluche to the south, and are part of the Picunche tribe that live north of the Itata River.
Related Events
Showing 4 events out of 4 total
Almagro, on reaching the Mapocho Valley in 1536, sends Gómez de Alvarado with an expedition of two hundred Spaniards, one hundred cavalry and one hundred foot, with a large group of Indian auxiliaries to the south of Chile with the mission of exploring the country to the Strait of Magellan.
The group advances without encountering much resistance from the Promaucaes.
The Spaniards under Gómez de Alvarado, after crossing the Itata River, are intercepted by a numerous contingent of Mapuches, perhaps as many as twenty-four thousand, armed with many bows and pikes.
The Mapuches launch a number of assaults that are successfully repulsed by the Spanish.
Frustrated by these reverses and by disorientation caused by the horses, iron weapons, and armor of the conquistadors (all of which are unknown to the Mapuches), the natives retreat, leaving many dead and more than one hundred prisoners.
The Spanish lose only two men but others are wounded.
Discouraged by the ferocity of the Mapuches, and the apparent lack of gold and silver in these lands, Gómez de Alvarado decides to return and inform Almagro what has happened.
This battle has a strong influence on Almagro's entire expedition, and motivates, in part, its full retreat the following year to Peru.
Almagro's own reconnaissance of the land and the bad news of Gómez de Alvarado's encounter with the fierce Mapuche, along with the bitter cold winter that settles ferociously upon them, only serves to confirm that everything has failed.
He never finds gold or the cities that Incan scouts had told him lay ahead, only communities of the indigenous population who live from subsistence agriculture.
Local tribes put up fierce resistance to the Spanish forces.
The exploration of the territories of Nueva Toledo, which will last two years, is marked by a complete failure for Almagro.
Despite this, at first he thinks staying and founding a city will serve well for his honor.
The initial optimism that had led Almagro to bring his son he had with the indigenous Panamanian Ana Martínez to Chile had faded.
Some historians have suggested that, but for the urging of his senior explorers, Almagro would probably have stayed permanently in Chile.
He is urged to return to Peru and this time take definitive possession of Cuzco, so as to consolidate an inheritance for his son.
Dismayed with his experience in the south, Almagro makes plans of return to Peru.
He never officially founds a city in the territory of what is now Chile.
Some accounts say that when Almagro found out about Felipillo's betrayal and his subsequent confession about purposely misinterpreting Pizarro's message to Atahualpa, he ordered his soldiers to capture Felipillo and tear his body apart with horses in front of the region's Curaca.
Nowadays, among Peruvians, the word "Felipillo" has taken a meaning similar to "traitor."
The withdrawal of the Spanish from the valleys of Chile is violent: Almagro authorizes his soldiers to ransack the natives' properties, leaving their soil desolate.
In addition, the Spanish soldiers take natives captive to serve as slaves.
The locals are captured, tied together, and forced to carry the heavy loads belonging to the conquistadors.