excerpt
In the days that followed, when Tamanoa returned with
Gaucaipuro, I took great care to learn the details of that fated battle. I
felt a burning need to know what had happened and I yielded to it,
committing to memory everything I heard and saw. Losada had told
me I might write the history of his expedition and I began to
understand that could be my mission.
Thousands of feet had pressed forward through the mountains
toward the savannah known as Maracapana, which meant ‘place of
maracas,’ maracas being a kind of small, round gourd; I supposed
the area was prolific in such trees.
From the coast and the cordillera, the caciques Naiquatá, Uripatá,
Guaicamacuto, Anarigua, Mamacuri, Querequemare, Prepocunate,
Araguaire and Guarauguta had headed south to join forces under
Guacaipuro’s command.
From the mountains east of the valley, of the tribe of the Mariches,
the caciques Aricabacuto and Aramaipuro, under whom Baruta
would lead his own contingent, had set out the day before with their
archers to be near the appointed place at dawn.
Although the formidable Chacao, chief of the Caracas, didn’t
need to travel long, for his dominions were at the outskirts of the
city, he was to fight with the Mariches. Paramaconi, chief of the
Toromainas, who dwelled in the area, was Guacaipuro’s most
trusted ally; together they had fought and crippled every incursion
the Spaniards had made into the area in the last six years.
Urimaure and Parnamacay, chiefs among the Tarmas, were
contributing a select number of their forces and had also set out the
previous night to join the others in the savannah of Maracapana,
which lay north between the newly founded city and the base of the
mountain range.
The great coalition of forces was on the move from every
direction.
Much later, I would learn from Benjamin that in Santiago de León
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