The History of Potosí by Arzans and the dramatic cycle of the death of Atahualpa in the Upper Peru

Abstract

From an analysis of the poetic approaches presented by Bartolomé Arzans de Orsúa y Vela in parts of his History of the Imperial Villa of Potosí (18th century) as well as the figure of the “poet historian” Juan Sobrino who was its early source, and other information from linguistics, rhetoric and history, the author reconsiders the plausibility of certain parts of the History considering the dramatization of 1555 in Potosí of the capture and death of Atahualpa in a verse in Spanish mixez d with native languages. The author indicates an unprecedented (and so far unidentified) early source of the History. The reading is linked and discussed in various ways with other precedents such as Lara (1957), Hanke and Mendoza (1965), Gisbert (1968, 1999), Burga (1988), Beyersdorff (1997) and Husson (1998, 2001).