The Quechua are Inca descendents and arrived in Chile by 1442 and 1470, during Tupac Yupanqui rule.
Inca troops and forced soldiers (Mitimaes) occupied the country up to the Maipo river, and they probably exploited the land further south, reaching the Itata and Bio-Bio rivers.
Contemporary Quechua came from Bolivia, mainly to work in the nitrate industry and in mining, by the early twentieth century. Later they moved to cities as Arica, Iquique, Ollagüe, Toconce, San Pedro, and others.