History
The Quijos region east of Coca was well known to the Incas, who ventured downhill to meet lowland tribes in peace and battle. It was also the first area east of the Andes to be penetrated by the Spanish. The anniversary of the European discovery of the Amazon River (February 12) is still celebrated in jungle cities with markets and fairs. Within a few centuries after European contact most of the region’s tens of thousands of inhabitants had fallen victim to smallpox and cholera.
The discovery of oil in the 1960s brought this once-stagnant backwater into the national consciousness. In the north, an oil pipeline helps transport the vast reserves that make Ecuador the third-largest oil exporter in Latin America.
Throughout the region, Quechua words on maps show the influence of the Lowland Quechua, who inhabit the foothills and forests in western Napo and northern Pastaza provinces. Also in the north are pockets of Siona/Secoya and Cofán. The Huaorani have a huge reserve in central Napo province and spill over into Yasuní National Park. To the south, the Shuar and Achuar saw their ancestral lands divided by the decades-old border dispute with Peru, which ended in 1998.
Read more about this topic: Oriente (Ecuador)
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
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