Biography

According to Wikipedia:

Francisco Pizarro (c. 1475–June 26, 1541) was a Spanish conquistador, conqueror of the Inca Empire and founder of the city of Lima.

Francisco Pizarro was born in Trujillo, Extremadura, Spain. He was an illegitimate son of Gonzalo Pizarro, who as colonel of infantry afterwards served in Italy under Gonsalvo de Cordova, and in Navarre, with some distinction.

Of Pizarro's early years hardly anything is known; but he appears to have been poorly cared for, and his education was neglected. Shortly after the news of the discovery of the New World had reached Spain he was in Seville, he sailed to the New World in 1509 and took part in various Spanish missions of exploration and conquest. He is heard of in 1510 as having taken part in an expedition from Hispaniola to Urab under Alonso de Ojeda, by whom he was entrusted with the charge of the unfortunate settlement at San Sebastian.

He accompanied Vasco Núñez de Balboa (whom he later helped to bring to the executioner's block) in the discovery of the Pacific; and under Pedro Arias de Avila he received a repartimento, and became a cattle-farmer at Panama. Here in 1522 he entered into a partnership with a priest named Hernando de Luque, and a soldier named Diego de Almagro, for purposes of exploration and conquest towards the south. Pizarro, Almagro and Luque afterwards renewed their compact in a more solemn and explicit manner, agreeing to conquer and divide equally among themselves the opulent empire they hoped to reach. Explorations were then undertaken down the west coast of South America, in which Pizarro, though left for months with but thirteen followers on a small island without ship or stores, persisted till he had coasted as far as about 9 S. and obtained distinct accounts of the Peruvian Empire.