Beginning of Spanish Colonization

Spanish Colonization of Bolivia began in 1524 when Francisco Pizarro arrived on the South American Pacific coast. At the time the Spanish arrived, the Aymara were under the control of the Inca Empire. Under Pizarro’s leadership in 1532, a small band of Spanish soldiers captured (and later executed) the ruler of the Incan Empire, Atawallpa, and thereby defeated the Inca, who were themselves previously weakened by a three-year war of royal succession (1529-1532) and an epidemic of smallpox that had spread to the region from the Spanish occupation of Central America. After defeating the remaining Inca military leaders and establishing a puppet Inca king, Pizarro founded the Ciudad de los Reyes in what is now Lima and established the capital of Spanish Colonial Peru [Kittleson, Bushnell & Lockhart, 2021].  

Following the Spanish conquest, the Aymara became victims of forced labor. They were enslaved to work on farms, plantations, and in mines, and as servants [Minahan, 2016]. During the early days of Spanish rule, there were rebellions (1536-1544) led by Incan puppet ruler Manco Capac II, and the Aymara kingdoms had to choose who to support as their overlords. One Aymara group, the Lupaca nation, supported Manco Capac II, while another, the Kolla, sided with the Spanish. After the uprising was crushed and the Spanish solidified control of the region that is now Bolivia, Potosí became the center of Spanish rule in Bolivia due both to the concentration of silver deposits in the area and to the fact that so many of the Aymara people were there. Over the next few centuries, the Aymara would continue to be subjected to forced labor, rebelling periodically [Morales, 2010].