4. A Slimy Surprise Attack
Francisco Pizarro set off to meet Emperor Atahualpa with 110 infantry and 67 cavalry, armed and armored with steel and equipped with three arquebuses and two small cannon. A meeting was arranged for November 16th, 1532, in a plaza in the town of Cajamarca. On the night of the 15th, Pizarro outlined to his men an audacious plan to seize Atahualpa. On the appointed day, Atahualpa, incautious about his own security, left his army camped outside Cajamarca, and arrived at the town’s plaza on a fine litter carried by 80 courtiers, and trailed by about 5000 nobles and other courtiers. The Incans were richly dressed in ceremonial garments and unarmed except for small ceremonial stone axes.
The Spaniards, concealed in buildings surrounding the plaza, with cavalry was hidden in alleys leading to the open square, fell upon Atahualpa and his party at a signal from Pizarro. The result was a massacre. The unarmored natives proved no match for the Spaniards’ steel swords, pikes, bullets, or crossbow bolts, while the Indians’ ceremonial stone axes were useless against Spanish plate armor. Thousands of natives were killed, the rest fled in panic, and not a single Spaniard lost his life.
