The Quitus were Pre-Columbian

Pre-Columbian era

The pre-Columbian era incorporates all period subdivisions in the history and prehistory of the Americas before the appearance of significant European influences on the American continents, spanning the time of the original settlement in the Upper Paleolithic period to European colonization during...

 indigenous peoples in Ecuador

Indigenous peoples in Ecuador

Indigenous peoples in Ecuador are the groups of people who were present in what became the South American nation of Ecuador when Europeans arrived. The term also includes their descendants from the time of the Spanish conquest to the present...

 who founded Quito

Quito

San Francisco de Quito, most often called Quito , is the capital city of Ecuador in northwestern South America. It is located in north-central Ecuador in the Guayllabamba river basin, on the eastern slopes of Pichincha, an active stratovolcano in the Andes mountains...

, which is now the capital of Ecuador

Ecuador

Ecuador , officially the Republic of Ecuador is a representative democratic republic in South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and by the Pacific Ocean to the west. It is one of only two countries in South America, along with Chile, that do not have a border...

. The inhabitants' existence spanned from 2000 BCE to the beginning of the Spaniards' conquest of the city in 1524. Their occupation spanned from the strip of land from Cerro del Panecillo in the south, to plaza de San Blas in the centre is the area where these first inhabitants lived. Today this strip has extended to become the great city it is now. The Quitus are responsible for the capital's name, and are of unknown relation to the town of Iquitos

Iquitos

Iquitos is the largest city in the Peruvian rainforest, with a population of 370,962. It is the capital of Loreto Region and Maynas Province.Located on the Amazon River, it is only above sea level, although it is more than from the mouth of the Amazon at Belém on the Atlantic Ocean...

.

History

The Quitu people were conquered by the Cara culture. Juan de Velasco

Juan de Velasco

Juan de Velasco y Pérez Petroche was an 18th-century Jesuit priest, historian, and professor of philosophy and theology from the Royal Audience of Quito. He was born in Riobamba to Juan de Velasco y López de Moncayo and to María Pérez Petroche. Among the universities where he taught was the...

 wrote in his 1767 book, Historia del Reino de Quito, the Cara founded the Kingdom of Quito around 980 CE. Together, the two cultures formed the Quitu-Cara culture.

Historians Jacinto Jijón y Caamaño

Jacinto Jijón y Caamaño

Jacinto Jijón y Caamaño was an Ecuadorian historian and politician, born in Quito on December 11, 1890 to Don Manuel Jijón Larrea and Doña Dolores Caamaño y Almada. He was the mayor of the city of Quito in the 1940s. He was a member of the Ecuadorian parliament and a candidate for the presidency...

 and Alfredo Pareja Diezcanseco

Alfredo Pareja Diezcanseco

Alfredo Pareja Diez Canseco — born Alfredo Pareja y Diez Canseco — was a prominent Ecuadorian novelist, essayist, journalist, historian and diplomat. An innovator of the 20th century Latin American novel, he was a member of the literary Grupo de Guayaquil...

contested the existence of such Kingdom and pointed to the dubious existence of that date, having no evidence of Quitu remains. The Quitus existence does not prove the contested Kingdom of Quito, only gives credence, and partially supports its existence. This belief is today seen by archeologist as an important concept, for it spared their archaeological remains from tomb robbers. Within the country today tomb robbers are recognized to have depleted other cultures of their archeological remains, most made of gold.

Organization

Excavations made on tombs showed the Quitus shared the belief of an afterlife, where they needed to retain certain belongings, and therefore were buried with them. Essentially the Quitus were agricultural people seen as a "pueblo alegre y festivo" (happy and festive people).