Indigenous peoples of Peru
Indigenous peoples of Peru
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Indigenous peoples of Peru

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Indigenous peoples of Peru

Indigenous peoples of Peru (Spanish: Pueblos indígenas del Perú), also known as Native Peruvians (Spanish: Peruanos nativos), are a large number of ethnic groups who inhabit territory in present-day Peru. Indigenous cultures developed here for thousands of years before the arrival of the Spanish in 1532.

In 2017, 5,972,606 Peruvians identified themselves as indigenous peoples and formed about 25.75% of the total population of Peru. At the time of the Spanish arrival, the indigenous peoples of the rain forest of the Amazon basin to the east of the Andes were mostly semi-nomadic tribes; they subsisted on hunting, fishing, gathering and slash and burn agriculture. Those peoples living in the Andes and to the west were dominated by the Inca Empire, who had a complex, hierarchical civilization. It developed many cities, building major temples and monuments with techniques of highly skilled stonemasonry.

Many of the estimated 2000 nations and tribes present in 1500 died out as a consequence of the expansion and consolidation of the Inca Empire and its successor after 1533, the Spanish empire. In the 21st century, the mixed-race mestizos are the largest component of the Peruvian population.

With the arrival of the Spanish, many Natives perished due to Eurasian infectious diseases among the foreigners, to which they had acquired no immunity.

All of the Peruvian Indigenous groups, such as the Urarina, and even those who live isolated in the most remote areas of the Amazon rainforest, such as the Matsés, Matis, and Korubo, have changed their ways of life to some extent under the influence of European-Peruvian culture. They have adopted the use of firearms and other manufactured items, and trade goods, although they remain separated from mainstream Peruvian society. Many Indigenous groups work to uphold traditional cultural practices and identities.

Anthropological and genetic evidence indicates that most of the original population of the Americas descended from migrants from North Asia (Siberia) who entered North America across the Bering Strait in at least three separate waves. DNA analysis has shown that most of those resident in Peru in 1500 were descended from the first wave of Asian migrants, who are theorized, but not proven conclusively, to have crossed Beringia at the end of the last glacial period during the Upper Paleolithic, around 24,000 BCE. Migrants from that first wave are thought to have reached Peru in the 10th millennium BCE, probably entering the Amazon basin from the northwest.

The Norte Chico civilization of Peru is the oldest known civilization in the Americas and one of the six sites where civilization, including the development of agriculture and government, separately originated in the ancient world. The sites, located 100 miles (160 km) north of Lima, developed a trade between coastal fisherman and cotton growers and built monumental pyramids around the 30th century BCE.

During the pre-Columbian era, the peoples who dominated the territory now known as Peru spoke languages, such as: Quechua, Aymara, Jivaroan, Tsimané, Tallán, Culli, Quingnam, Muchik, and Puquina. The peoples had different social and organizational structures, and distinct languages and cultures.

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