Note 427 — Chapter LXXXVII

The country round Guamanga was inhabited, in ancient times, by the nation of Pocras. They joined the Chancas under Anco-huallu in their war against the Ynca (see note at p. 280), and after the bloody defeat of the allied tribes on the plain of Yahuarpampa, and the emigration of Anco-huallu, they again rose in rebellion. They were finally crushed in a bloody battle at the foot of the heights of Condor-canqui, by the Ynca Huira-ccocha, in a place which has ever since been called Aya-cucho (“the corner of dead men”). Four hundred and fifty years afterwards, on the same spot, the battle was fought between the Spaniards and the Patriots, which finally established the independence of Peru. (December 9th, 1824.)

After the overthrow of the Pocras, the Ynca was serving out rations of llama flesh to his soldiers when a falcon (huaman) came wheeling in circles over his head. He threw up a piece of meat crying Huaman-ca (Take! falcon), and the bird caught it and flew away. “Lo,” cried the soldiers, “even the birds of the air obey him:” and the place was ever afterwards called Huaman-ca, corrupted by the Spaniards into Guamanga. Since the independence, the name of the city has been altered to Ayacucho, in honour of the battle.

Others derive the name from Huaman (falcon) and Ccaca (a rock)—“the Falcon’s Rock.”