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Although the invasion and colonization of Peru in the early 16th century has long been a subject of intense scrutiny in history, scholars generally have focused on men’s history. The neglect of women’s involvement in the invasion and colonization process has provided an incomplete vision of the early colonial period. Women in Peru from 1530 to 1550 were powerful and active members of society, participating in the political and economic spheres, yet their contributions to the development of the colony largely has gone unstudied. My dissertation is interdisciplinary, relying on the tools provided by anthropology and archaeology, art and textual criticism, and other ethnographies, to provide greater context and meaning to the sources available to study the early colonial period. By analyzing chronicles side-by-side with contemporary archival materials, this work shifts the focus of scholarship to reveal that the victorious conquistadors did not operate alone. Rather, they acted alongside a variety of women, from those who acted as spies, to those who carried out economic affairs, to the women who allied their families with them and involved them in Andean, Spanish, and hybrid political conspiracies. Inca women wielded a surprising amount of partisan prestige and power, while European women provided economic stability to their relatives. This dissertation places women at the center of a larger narrative about the creation of a joint Inca and European hegemonic state that would be attacked throughout the 16th century by Spanish reformers.