Nongoniel

Nongoniel or "Mangolien" [Rosales, “Historia General del Reino de Chile”, Tomo II, CAPÍTULO LII] was the Mapuche Toqui in 1585, and son of the previous toqui Cayancura. He was the first Toqui to use cavalry with the Mapuche army in the Arauco War.

Following the failure of his seige of Arauco, Cayancura, retired, leaving the command of the army to his son Nongoniel. He collected some infantry, and a hundred and fifty horse, which from then on began to be part of Mapuche armies. Nongoniel returned to invest the Arauco fortress again, and with his cavalry it became so closely invested, that the Spaniards were unable to supply it and were forced to evacuate it.

Following this success Nongoniel moved against the fort of Trinidad which protected the passage of Spanish supplies via the Bio-bio River but clashed with a division of Spanish troops, under Francisco Hernandez, were he lost an arm and had other dangerous wounds. He retreated to a neighbouring mountain, where he was ambushed by a force under the Spanish Sargento Mayor and slain with fifty of his soldiers. The same day Cadeguala was proclaimed Toqui by Mapuche army.

References

Source

* Diego de Rosales, “Historia General del Reino de Chile”, Flandes Indiano, 3 tomos. Valparaíso 1877 - 1878.
** [http://books.google.com/books?id=C34CAAAAYAAJ Historia general de el Reyno de Chile: Flandes Indiano Vol. 2] Capítulo LII
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=FhcTAAAAYAAJ The Geographical, Natural, and Civil History of Chili By Don Juan Ignatius Molina, Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, Paternoster-Row, London, 1809] pg 234-35
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=C8C2FNNWaBEC José Ignacio Víctor Eyzaguirre, Historia eclesiastica: Politica y literaria de Chile, IMPRENTA DEL COMERCIO, VALPARAISO, June 1830] List of Toquis, pg. 162-163.