Puruhá

In the early period they grew subsistence crops, raised guinea pigs, and were part of trade with the Inca before the latter took over the Andean region in the 15th century.

The numbers of Puruha and Quechua peoples declined dramatically after that because of high mortality from new infectious diseases carried by Spanish colonists.

The indigenous peoples had largely shifted to speaking Quechua languages, introduced by the Inca with their takeover in the 15th century.

The change in language adversely affected the ability of the Puruhá to maintain the distinctiveness of their culture from Quechua peoples.

Catholic Christianity is a syncretic faith, and many of the Puruhá gradually combined their traditional ideas with their understanding and practice of Catholicism.

In the 1960s Protestant Evangelicalism became increasingly popular as an alternative to a Catholicism considered to support the upper over the lower classes.