PRE INKA PERIOD First inhabitants of Peru were nomad hunters who lived in caverns in the regions of the Peruvian coast. The oldest site, the cavern Pikimachay, date from 12.000 BC Cotton, corn, beans and peppers were cultivated since the year 4.000 BC; later, the most advanced cultures as the Chavin, introduced fishing, agriculture and religion to the country. In the years 300 BC, the Chavin disappeared in an unexplainable way but through the centuries many other cultures - the Nazca, Paracas and Wari became very important. 
 INKA PERIOD  Incas were the leaders of the largest American empire. At the end of the 14th century the empire began to expand from its initial territory in the Cuzco area, the southern Andean mountains of South America. This expansion ended brutally with the Spanish invasion leaded by Francisco Pizarro in 1532.
By the time of its surrender, the empire controlled a population estimated of 12 million people which represents today Peru and Ecuador and a big part of Chile, Bolivia and Argentina. The Inca empireIncas called their territory Tawantinsuyu, what in Quechua, the Inca language, means The Four Parts. A territory of varied and strongly marked lands and weathers, that consisted of a large desert strip on the coast, interspersed with rich irrigated valleys; the high summits of the Andes; and the mountain summit of the tropical forest in the East. The word Inca designated the leader himself as well as the people of Cuzco valley, the empire capital. It is sometimes used to designate all the people included in the Tawantinsuyu, but it is not correct. Most of the smaller kingdoms kept their identity even dough they were attached politically and economically to the Incas. Quechua was the official language and was spoken in most of the communities until the arrival of the Spanish, but almost 20 local dialects remained in some parts of the empire.  Incas developed a very functional style of public architecture that was remarkable for its advanced Engineering and fine stone building techniques. The cities plan was based on a system of main avenues intersected by smaller roads that converged on a main open square surrounded by municipal buildings and churches. The structure was a of only one floor of a perfect assembly of cut stones; they used also brick of ground and straw on the coastal regions. For the construction of large monuments like the Sacschuaman, large fortress near Cuzco, massive blocs on a polygon shape were put together with an extraordinary precision. In the mountain regions, like the spectacular Andean city located in Machu Picchu, the Inca architecture reflected often ingenious adaptations of the natural relief.
 The State religion was based on the Sun worship. Inca emperors were considered the descendants of the god Sun and were worshiped as divinities. The gold, Sun gold symbol, was exploited a lot for the use of leaders and members of the élite, not as currency but for decoration, clothing and rituals. Religion dominated all the politic structure. From the Sun Temple in the center of Cuzco, we could draw an imaginary line towards the places of worship of the different social classes in the city.
Religious practice consisted on oracle consultations, sacrifices for offertory, religious trances and public confessions. An annual cycle of religious festivities was regulated by the Inca Calendar, extremely precise, so was the agricultural year. Because of these and other aspects, the Inca culture resembled a lot some cultures of the Meso-America like the Aztec and Maya. COLONIAL PERIOD At the beginning of the 15th century, the Inca Empire had the control of a very large area, bringing its influence even to Colombia and Chile.  Between 1526 and 1528, the Spanish conqueror Francisco Pizarro explored the Peruvian coastal regions and, marveled at the richness of the Inca Empire, went back to Spain to collect money and recruit men for another expedition to this country. Back to Peru, he went to Cajamarca, in the north, where he captured, ransomed and executed the Inca emperor Atahualpa in 1533. Later on Pizarro founded the city of Lima in 1535 but was murdered six years later. The rebellion of the last Inca chief, Manco Inca, ended in a failure with his submission in 1572.
The following two centuries were peaceful; Lima became the political, social and commercial center, the most important of the Andean nations. Meanwhile, the exploitation of the Indians by their invaders ended up in a rebellion in 1780, with the leadership of the self-named Inca Tupac Amaru II. The rebellion was short and several leaders were captured and executed. The Peruvian loyalty towards Spain continued until 1821 when the country was liberated by to liberators: the Venezuelan Simón Bolívar and Argentine José de San Martín.  REPUBLICAN PERIOD  In 1866, Peru won a quick war against Spain but was humiliated by Chile in the Pacific War (1879-1883) that caused the loss of the very lucrative salt mines in the north of the Atacama desert. Peru went also to war with Ecuador because of a border problem in 1941. The 1942 Rio de Janeiro Treaty gave the northern area of Marañón River to Peru but the decision was hardly contested by Ecuador.
 A guerrilla inspired from the Cubans appeared in 1965 directed by the National Liberation Army was unsuccessful, but a series of national strikes and a violent insurrection of the Maoist guerrillas of the (Sendero Luminoso) generated a political instability in the years 1980. Another guerrilla group, the Revolutionary Movement Tupac Amaru (MRTA), was also reinforced during this period. However, the victory in the presidential elections of July 1990 of Alberto Kenyo Fujimori (wrongly named El Chino-the Chinese because of his Japanese origins) against the Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa and the capture in 1992 if the MRTA and Sendero Luminoso leaders gave the hope of an important period of peace. Unfortunately, the confrontations in February 1995 with Ecuador because of the border conflict needed the intervention of international observers to supervise the conflict area. The main social problems were still unemployment and poverty, despite the fast economic growth of Peru. Fujimori was reelected on April 1995 with 64,42% of votes, in spite of the notoriety of another candidate, the former general secretary of the United Nations, Javier Perez de Cuellar, with only 21,80%.
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