Language planning with Spanish colonization. When the Spanish first arrived in Peru, Quechua served as a language of wider communication, a lingua franca, between Spaniards and Peruvian natives. As the years passed, Spaniards asserted the superiority of the Spanish language; as a result, Spanish gained prestige, taking over as a language of wider communication and the dominant language of Peru. In 1975, under the leadership of President Juan Velasco Alvarado, the revolutionary government of Peru declared Quechua an official language of the Peruvian state, "coequal with Spanish." Four years later, the law was reversed. Peru's 1979 constitution declares Spanish the only official
Juan Fernández de Velasco, 5th Duke of Frías Juan Fernández de Velasco, 5th Duke of Frías Juan Fernández de Velasco, 5th Duke of Frías ( – 15 March 1613) was a Spanish nobleman and diplomat. Juan Fernández de Velasco was the son of Íñigo Fernández de Velasco; and of Maria Angela de Aragón y Guzmán El Bueno. He inherited his father's title of Constable of Castile, and was present at the signing of the Treaty of London (1604). Juan Fernández de Velasco was also Governor of the Duchy of Milan in the period 1592–1600 and 1610–1612. In 1595, he led the Spanish forces in the Battle of Fontaine-Française