This thesis raises questions about Pizarro's relevance in the colonial period as well as the political discourses that reinterpret his image. How does Pizarro appear in a text? What ideas are associated with Pizarro's role as a colonial authority? What role does his image play in colonial narratives? What is controlling the development of Pizarro's image? How can the different representations of Pizarro speak about the flow of history in the colonial period? In answering these questions, this thesis thematically illustrates the flow of Pizarro's image between the sixteenth and the seventeenth century. Chapter I examines the first representations of Pizarro in the conquest of Peru through a close analysis of the structure of the events in the chronicles of Francisco de Xerez and others. This chapter presents an agreement on the values and morality around the conquest of Peru and the centrality given to Francisco Pizarro. Chapter II concentrates on the chronicles after the Spanish civil wars in Peru, revealing a more nuanced interpretation of Pizarro's role in the conquest. Chapter III analysis the chronicles regarding the (re)interpretations of the indigenous past. This chapter addresses a shift in the discussion on moral individuals and the values associated with the conquest and Pizarro's role. In this chapter, I bring attention to the different representations of Pizarro that reinterprets the significance of his figure in these narratives. With the scope of this thesis, I make one intervention on Pizarro's representations in the colonial period. I argue that Pizarro's representations show the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as a highly moralized period. While there is not a strong framing of Pizarro in the scope of my thesis, his representations reveal issues of moral standards in the New World. Pizarro emerges as a laudable figure in the conquest of Peru in Francisco de Xerez's chronicle. Still, his image is morally reassessed after the civil wars that questions the role of the conquistador in the New World. Finally, in the (re)imagination of the indigenous past, Pizarro's significance is reduced by the new characterizations of indigenous people in the conquest. His different representations show the nuance of different perspectives regarding religion, politics, justice, social class interests, lineage, and civilization. Pizarro is a narrative element driven by personal discourses that continually revise their sense of morality in the New World. The different array of perspectives indicates that Francisco Pizarro is not a settled image. Nonetheless, his interpretations position morality as an individual and collective matter that shows ideas and understandings of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
"},{"label":"Degree","value":["Bachelor of Arts with Departmental Honors"]},{"label":"Administrative Note","value":"Drupal Node ID: 24179