Atahualpa, Atahuallpa, Atabalipa, or Atawallpa (Quito – Cajamarca, August 29, 1533), was the last sovereign emperor of the Tahuantinsuyu, or the Inca Empire. He became emperor upon defeating his older half-brother Huáscar in a civil war sparked by the death of their father, Inca Huayna Capac, from an infectious disease thought to be smallpox. During the Spanish Invasion, the Spaniard Francisco Pizarro crossed his path, captured Atahualpa, and used him to control the Inca empire. Eventually, the Spanish executed Atahualpa by garrote, ending the Inca Empire (although several successors claimed the title of Sapa Inca ("unique Inca") and led a resistance against the invading Spaniards).
By the mid 1520s, the Inca Empire was ruled by Huayna Capac who for several years had waged war on the northern frontiers of the Empire, in what is now northern Ecuador and southern Colombia. At some time between 1525 and 1527 a smallpox epidemic struck the Inca army and court killing thousands of persons including the emperor and Ninan Cuyochi, his probable heir. Huayna Capac was succeeded as Sapa Inca by his son Huascar, who was crowned in the Inca capital of Cusco; meanwhile, his brother Atahualpa was left in charge of the Inca army in the north probably as provincial governor on behalf of his brother. According to chroniclers, Huayna Capac divided the empire in two: the northern part, ruled from Quito, and the southern from Cusco. After a few years of peace, civil war broke out between the brothers but its causes remain unclear as different chronicles give different accounts.
