Promaucaes

Promaucae, also spelled as Promaucas or Purumaucas (quechua purum awqa: wild people), were an indigenous pre-Columbian Mapuche tribal group that lived in the present territory of Chile, south of the Maipo River basin of Santiago, Chile and the Itata River. Those to the north were called Quillotanes and Mapochoes by the Spanish colonists). They spoke Mapudungun, like the Moluche to the south, and were part of the Picunche tribe that lived north of the Itata River.

The Inca referred to all the peoples who were not under their empire as puruma auca. Because these Picunche tribes were successful in defending their territory against the Inca Empire in the Battle of the Maule, they were given this distinctive name. In an effort to transliterate the word into Spanish phonetics, the Spanish referred to them as the Purumaucas or Promaucaes. The early Spanish in the area knew their region as the province of Promaucae and its inhabitants were called Promaucaes.

The Promaucae are the first inhabitants of the Rancagua Valley of whom there is a historical account. The Mapuche included them in the group that they knew as the picunche, "people of the north". The Promaucae, as has already been mentioned, constituted a distinct cultural unit separate from those Picunche who lived to the north of the Maipo, named mapochoes, and to the south of the Maule, designated maules and cauquenes. The Inca invaders noted the great military capacity and will to fight of the Promucae.

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