Amaru is used in several cultures; in African usage it is often understood as meaning "strength" or "grace."
Amaru is a name of profound power rooted in Quechua, the language of the Inca Empire and still spoken by millions across the Andes today. In Quechua, amaru (sometimes spelled amarú) means "serpent" — specifically, a sacred, mythological serpent of enormous size, associated with rivers, rain, fertility, and the underworld.
The Amaru was a liminal creature that moved between the world above and below, and in Andean cosmology it served as a symbol of transformation, wisdom, and the cyclical forces of nature. The name carries this entire sacred worldview within it, connecting the bearer to an unbroken thread of indigenous American spirituality. The name's most famous historical bearer is Túpac Amaru, the last indigenous Inca ruler executed by Spanish conquistadors in 1572, and later Túpac Amaru II (José Gabriel Condorcanqui), who led a massive indigenous uprising against Spanish colonial rule in Peru in 1780 — one of the largest and most consequential rebellions in colonial history.
His legacy was so potent that the revolutionary urban guerrilla group Movimiento Tupac Amaru took his name in the twentieth century, and rapper Tupac Shakur was named in his honor by his politically conscious mother. Today, Amaru is embraced both within indigenous Andean communities as a name of cultural pride and by parents across Latin America and beyond who are drawn to its mythic resonance, its strong rhythmic sound, and its legacy of resistance and transformation.