Tom Holland

So what's he been doing?

So if you listen to the Fall of the Aztecs, you will remember that Pedro Alvarado is a great laugh.

But you want to stay on the right side of him.

So actually, he's been roistering around Guatemala and he's been slaughtering indigenous people and being a total legend.

And he's heard all these rumors of the gold of Peru and he wants in.

So he finally turns up.

February 1534, Pedro de Alvarado lands on the coast of Ecuador with a load of Spanish infantry and crossbowmen, 500 of them.

So he's turned up with a lot of men and 4,000 Guatemalans.

And the great thing about Pedro is everything he touches turns to dust and disaster.

Even as he arrives, people in Central America are writing to Spain saying, Pedro's turned up and it's all going to go horribly wrong for him.

So an official in Panama writes to Charles V, although there are many Guatemalans, I believe they will all die soon because they're from a hot country and they're going to a cold one.

And that sounds like the official in Panama is an idiot, but no, he's actually quite right.

So Alvarado kicks off in absolutely textbook Pedro fashion.

He indulges in what John Hemming calls some unnecessary cruelty to the coastal tribes.

So even by Spanish standards, he is so cruel that the other conquistadors later hold a judicial inquiry.

I mean, how bad do you have to be?

Yeah, for all the other guys, Pizarro, Macro, all these people saying you've crossed the line.

So to give you an indication, he starts enslaving women and children in sledge chain gangs.

He hangs some village chiefs.

He has people burned alive.