Item: i101304

Authentic Coin of:

Peru
150th Anniversary of Independence – Tupac Amaru
1971
Silver 50 Soles 37mm (21.70 grams)  0.800 Silver ( 0.5517 oz. ASW)
Reference: KM# 256 (1971)
BANCO CENTRAL DE RESERVA DEL PERU 8 DECIMOS FINO 
1971, Coat-of-arms.
SESQUICENTENARIO DE LA INDEPENDENCIA DEL PERU TUPAC AMARU 
50 CINCUENTA SOLES DE ORO PAREJA LIMA 1821 – 1971, Tupac Amaru facing 3/4 right.

You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of 
Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.

Túpac 
Amaru (1545 – 24 September 1572) was the last monarch (Sapa Inca) 
of the Neo-Inca State, the remnants of the Inca Empire in Vilcabamba, Peru. 
He was executed by the Spanish following a months-long pursuit after the 
fall of the last stronghold of the Neo-Inca State.

The name is also 
spelled Tupac, Topa, Tupaq,
Thupaq, Thupa, or other similar variants, and
Amaro instead of Amaru. It comes from Quechua
Thupaq, “Royal” or “Shining”, and Amaru, “Serpent” (or a 
mythological serpent-like being).

Following the Spanish conquest of 
Peru in the 1530s, a few members of the royal family established the small 
independent Neo-Inca State in Vilcabamba, which was located in the 
relatively inaccessible Upper Amazon to the northeast of Cusco. The founder 
of this state was Manco Inca Yupanqui (also known as Manco Cápac II), who 
had initially allied himself with the Spanish, then led an unsuccessful war 
against them before establishing himself in Vilcabamba in 1540. After a 
Spanish attack in 1544 in which Manco Inca Yupanqui was killed, his son 
Sayri Tupac assumed the title of Sapa Inca (emperor, literally 
“only Inca”), before accepting Spanish authority in 1558, moving to Cuzco, 
and dying (perhaps by poison) in 1561. He was succeeded in Vilcabamba by his 
brother Titu Cusi, who himself died in 1571. Túpac Amaru, another brother of 
the two preceding emperors, then succeeded to the title in Vilcabamba.

At this time the Spanish were still unaware of the death of the previous
Sapa Inca (Titu Cusi) and had routinely sent two ambassadors to 
continue ongoing negotiations being held with Titu Cusi. They were both 
killed on the border by an Inca captain.

Using the justification that 
the Incas had “broken the inviolate law observed by all nations of the world 
regarding ambassadors” the new viceroy, Francisco de Toledo, Count of 
Oropesa, decided to attack and conquer Vilcabamba. He declared war on 14 
April 1572. The first engagement of the war commenced in the Vilcabamba 
valley on 1 June. The Inca people attacked first with much spirit despite 
being only lightly armed. Again and again, they attempted to lift the siege 
held by the Spanish and their native allies but each time they were forced 
to retreat. On 24 June the Spanish entered Vilcabamba to find it deserted 
and the Sapa Inca gone. The city had been entirely destroyed, and 
the last remnants of the Inca Empire, the Neo-Inca State now officially 
ceased to exist.

Túpac Amaru had left the previous day with a party of 
about 100 and headed west into the lowland forests. The group, which 
included his generals and family members, had then split up into smaller 
parties in an attempt to avoid capture.

Three groups of Spanish 
soldiers pursued them. One group captured Titu Cusi’s son and wife. A second 
returned with military prisoners along with gold, silver and other precious 
jewels. The third group returned with Túpac Amaru’s two brothers, other 
relatives and several of his generals. The Sapa Inca and his 
commander remained at large.

Following this, a group of forty 
hand-picked soldiers under Martín García Óñez de Loyola set out to pursue 
them. They followed the Masahuay river for 170 miles, where they found an 
Inca warehouse with quantities of gold and the Inca’s tableware. The Spanish 
captured a group of Chunco and compelled them to tell them what they had 
seen, and if they had seen the Sapa Inca. They reported that he had 
gone down river, by boat, to a place called Momorí. The Spaniards then 
constructed five rafts and pursued them.

At Momorí, they discovered 
that Tupac Amaru had escaped by land. They followed with the help of the 
Manarí, who advised which path the Inca had followed and reported that Túpac 
was slowed by his wife, who was about to give birth. After a fifty-mile 
march, they saw a campfire around nine o’clock at night. They found the
Sapa Inca Túpac Amaru and his wife warming themselves. They assured 
them that no harm would come to them and secured their surrender. Túpac 
Amaru was arrested.

The captives were brought back to the ruins of 
Vilcabamba and together they were all marched into Cuzco on 21 September. 
The invaders also brought the mummified remains of Manco Cápac and Titu Cusi 
and a gold statue of Punchao, a representation of the Inca’s lineage 
containing the mortal remains of the hearts of the deceased Inca kings. 
These sacred items were then destroyed.

The five captured Inca generals received a summary trial and were sentenced 
to death by hanging. Several had already died of torture or disease.

The trial of the Sapa Inca himself began a couple of days later. 
Túpac Amaru was convicted of the murder of the priests in Vilcabamba. Túpac 
Amaru was sentenced to be beheaded. It was reported in various sources in 
1598 that numerous Catholic clerics, convinced of Túpac Amaru’s innocence, 
pleaded to no avail, on their knees, that the Inca be sent to Spain for a 
trial instead of being executed.

Many have argued that Viceroy Toledo, 
in executing a head of state recognized by the Spanish as an independent 
king, exceeded his authority and committed a crime within the political 
ideas of his own time. Other claims have been made to the contrary — that 
Túpac Amaru was in rebellion (his predecessors having allegedly accepted 
Spanish authority), that Toledo had tried peaceful means to settle 
differences, that three of his ambassadors to the Inca were murdered, and 
that Túpac Amaru subsequently raised an army to resist the colonial army. 
The King of Spain, Philip II, disapproved of the execution.

An 
eyewitness report from the day recalls him riding a mule with hands tied 
behind his back and a rope around his neck. Other witnesses reported there 
were great crowds and the Sapa Inca was surrounded by hundreds of 
guards with lances. In front of the Cathedral of Santo Domingo in the 
central square of Cuzco a black-draped scaffold had been erected. Reportedly 
10,000 to 15,000 witnesses were present.

Túpac Amaru mounted the 
scaffold accompanied by the Bishop of Cuzco. As he did, it was reported by 
the same witnesses that a “multitude of Indians, who completely filled the 
square, saw that lamentable spectacle ] that their lord and Inca was to die, 
they deafened the skies, making them reverberate with their cries and 
wailing.”

As reported by eyewitnesses Baltasar de Ocampa and Friar 
Gabriel de Oviedo, Prior of the Dominicans at Cuzco, the Sapa Inca 
raised his hand to silence the crowds, and his last words were: “Ccollanan 
Pachacamac ricuy auccacunac yawarniy hichascancuta.” (“Pacha Kamaq, witness 
how my enemies shed my blood.”)

Peru, 
officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South 
America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by 
Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the west 
by the Pacific Ocean. Peru is an extremely biodiverse country with habitats 
ranging from the arid plains of the Pacific coastal region in the west to 
the peaks of the Andes mountains vertically extending from the north to the 
southeast of the country to the tropical Amazon Basin rainforest in the east 
with the Amazon river.

Peruvian territory was home to several ancient cultures, ranging from the 
Norte Chico civilization in the 32nd century BC, the oldest civilization in 
the Americas, to the Inca Empire, the largest and most sophisticated state 
in pre-Columbian America. The Spanish Empire conquered the region in the 
16th century and established a Viceroyalty that encompassed most of its 
South American colonies, with its capital in Lima. Peru formally proclaimed 
independence in 1821, and following the military campaigns of José de San 
Martín and Simón Bolívar, and the decisive battle of Ayacucho, Peru secured 
independence in 1824. In the ensuing years, the country enjoyed relative 
economic and political stability, which ended shortly before the War of the 
Pacific with Chile. Throughout the 20th century, Peru endured armed 
territorial disputes, coups, social unrest, and internal conflicts, as well 
as periods of stability and economic upswing. Alberto Fujimori was elected 
to the presidency in 1990; his government was credited with economically 
stabilizing Peru and successfully ending the Shining Path insurgency, though 
he was widely accused of human rights violations and suppression of 
political dissent. Fujimori left the presidency in 2000 and was charged with 
human rights violations and imprisoned until his pardon by President Pedro 
Pablo Kuczynski in 2017.

Peru 
is a representative democratic republic divided into 25 regions. It is 
classified as an emerging market^[9] with a high level of human 
development and an upper middle income level with a poverty rate around 19 
percent. It is one of the region’s most prosperous economies with an average 
growth rate of 5.9% and it has one of the world’s fastest industrial growth 
rates at an average of 9.6%. Its main economic activities include mining, 
manufacturing, agriculture and fishing; along with other growing sectors 
such as telecommunications and biotechnology. The country forms part of The 
Pacific Pumas, a political and economic grouping of countries along Latin 
America’s Pacific coast that share common trends of positive growth, stable 
macroeconomic foundations, improved governance and an openness to global 
integration. Peru ranks high in social freedom and it has the third lowest 
homicide rate in South America; it is an active member of the Asia-Pacific 
Economic Cooperation, the Pacific Alliance, the Trans-Pacific Partnership 
and the World Trade Organization; and is considered as a middle power.

Peru has a multiethnic population of over 31 million, which includes 
Amerindians, Europeans, Africans and Asians. The main spoken language is 
Spanish, although a significant number of Peruvians speak Quechua, Aymara or 
other native languages. This mixture of cultural traditions has resulted in 
a wide diversity of expressions in fields such as art, cuisine, literature, 
and music.