Five interesting facts about the Inca writer Garcilaso de la Vega

Curiosities about writers always generate intrigue among their readers. After a week of commemorating his birth (April 12), it is a good time to remember the Inca writer Garcilaso de la Vega and his iconic works, which were part of the testimony history of the Viceroyalty of Peru. To the point that it is part of the triumvirate with Cervantes and Shakespeare.

However, there are little-known aspects of the writer that can attract attention. Along these lines, the BBVA Foundation has 5 interesting things about the historian to get to know him better:

1. HIS BIRTH NAME IS GÓMEZ SUÁREZ DE FIGUEROA

First we must remember that his mother is a native Peruvian, and that is why he was considered an illegitimate child. To the point that he had to fight hard to earn the right to use his father's surname, Garcilaso de la Vega. Time passed and as a writer he added the name Inca, with which he signed from 1563. How did he do it? Well, he brought together his two cultural heritages in the same firm and proudly showed them to an audience that did not see the mestizos with good eyes.

2. HE WAS A MILITARY MAN IN HIS YOUTH

Another curiosity is that Garcilaso de la Vega lived in Peru until he moved to Spain at the age of 21. He was a military man and participated in several military campaigns until he became interested in religion, history and literature. Although he asked King Philip II's permission to return to Peru and granted it, he never returned to perform the service, because he preferred to continue his passion: writing.

3. HIS MASTERPIECE, REAL COMMENTARIES OF THE INCAS

His best-known work is Real Commentarios, divided into two parts. The first, General History of Peru, was published in Lisbon in 1609 and the second, Commentaries, was released a year after his death. The first volume, which tells the pre-Hispanic history of Peru, was written to “fulfill the obligation, which was owed to the country and maternal relatives”.

The second part is a defense of his lineage and a historical vision of the Inca empire and the Spanish conquest. This is seen as a contradiction to what he had written in the first volume to the point that his veracity and historical accuracy were questioned.

However, Real Commentaries is considered, from the literary point of view, a key work of Andean civilization and a starting point for Latin American literature.

4. DEATH IN CORDOBA

Garcilaso de la Vega, died in Cordoba, Spain, on April 23, 1616. He died after a long illness and wanted to be buried in the Chapel of the Souls of the Cathedral of Cordoba. As an additional fact, on his tomb you can read this epitaph, which he himself wrote:

“The Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, distinguished man, worthy of perpetual memory, illustrious of blood, expert in letters, brave in arms, son of Garcilaso de la Vega from the ducal houses of Feria and Infantado, and Isabel Palla, niece of Huayna Capac, the last Emperor of the Indies. He commented on La Florida, translated Hebrew Lion and composed the Royal Commentaries. He lived in Cordoba with much religion, died exemplary; he endowed this chapel, buried himself in it; he linked his property to the suffrage of the souls of Purgatory.”

5. DETAIL OF KING JUAN CARLOS TO GARCILASO DE LA VEGA

Even the kings know that Garcilaso de la Vega made a mark centuries later. An example was on November 25, 1978, when King Juan Carlos traveled to Peru. There he deposited in the Cathedral of Cuzco a chest with part of the ashes of the Inca Garcilaso de la Vega as a gesture and symbol of the union between the two cultures:

“By giving you today these ashes of the Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, as King of Spain and on behalf of my homeland, I want to show that our mixed race solidarity and the commitment it represents. More than a biological dimension, it is also, and above all, a cultural validity. Garcilaso, a real symbol of this evidence, remains, both in America and in Spain, as an exemplary testimony.”

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