Incas

Spanish conquest and Vilcabamba

Spanish conquistadors led by Francisco Pizarro explored south from Panama, reaching Inca territory by 1526. It was clear that they had reached a wealthy land with prospects of great treasure. After one more expedition in 1529, Pizarro returned to Spain and received royal approval to conquer the Inca region and become its viceroy.

At the time the Spanish returned to Peru in 1532, a war of succession between Huayna Capac's son Huascar and half brother Atahualpa was in full swing. Additionally, unrest among newly conquered territories, and smallpox, spreading from Central America, had considerably weakened the empire. The Spanish invaders told the Inca that the diseases decimating their population were sent from the Christian god as punishment for their idolatrous ways.

Pizarro did not have a formidable force. With just 180 men, 27 horses and 1 cannon, he often used diplomacy to talk his way out of potential confrontations that could have easily ended in defeat. Their first engagement was the Battle of Puná (near present-day Guayaquil, Ecuador) where his forces rapidly overcame the indigenous warriors of Puná Island. Pizarro then founded the city of Piura in July 1532. Hernando de Soto was sent inland to explore the interior; he returned with an invitation to meet Atahualpa, who had defeated his half brother in the civil war and was resting at Cajamarca with his army of 80,000 troops.

Pizarro met with the Inca, who had brought only a small retinue. Through interpreters, Pizarro requested the new Inca ruler convert to Christianity. A disputed legend claims that Atahualpa was handed a Bible and threw it on the floor. The Spanish supposedly interpreted this action as reason for war. Though some chroniclers suggest that Atahualpa simply did not understand the notion of a book, others portray Atahualpa as being genuinely curious and inquisitive in the situation. Regardless, the Spanish attacked the Inca's retinue, capturing Atahualpa.

Atahualpa offered the Spaniards enough gold to fill the room he was imprisoned in, and twice that amount in silver, in order to be freed. The Incas fulfilled this ransom, but Pizarro refused to release him. During Atahualpa's imprisonment Huascar was assassinated. The Spanish maintained it was at Atahualpa's orders, and this was one of the charges used against Atahualpa when the Spanish finally decided to put him to death in August 1533.

The Spanish installed his brother, Manco Inca Yupanqui, upon the Empire's throne. Yupanqui cooperated with the Spaniards while the conquistadors fought to put down resistance in the north. Meanwhile an associate of Pizarro's, Diego de Almagro, attempted to claim Cuzco for himself. Yupanqui attempted to use this intra-Spanish feud to his advantage, recapturing Cuzco in 1536, but the Spanish retook the city.

Manco Inca Yupanqui then retreated to the mountains of Vilcabamba, where he and his successors ruled for another 36 years, sometimes raiding the Spanish or inciting revolts against them. In 1572 the last Inca stronghold was discovered, and the last ruler, Túpac Amaru, Manco's son, was captured and executed, bringing the Inca Empire to an end.

Politics and government

The Inca Empire was separated into four sections together known as 'Ttahuantin-suyu' or "land of the four sections" each ruled by a governor or viceroy called 'Apu-cuna' under the leadership on the central 'Sapa Inca'. Cuzco was the central capital of the Inca Empire from which where the Sapa Inca ruled from. According to the oral traditions of the Inca the empire was ruled by 14 kings in succession. The earliest kings are likely either local leaders of ayllus around Cuzco or possibly mythical figures.

The term 'ayllu' refers to a grouping of indigenous people of South America and has been translated as clan. The term represents a group based on assumed blood-ties which operates as an economic and social unit. The Inca Empire was essentially several Andean ayllus controlled by a few Inca ayllus. As an economic unit the ayllu represented collective ownership of the land as well as other resources such as llama herds and water sources. The success and cohesiveness of the Andean ayllus was largely attributed to communal agriculture. Ayllus could regularly split apart because of economic hardships, ignoring blood ties, or come together with other ayllus with whom they did not share genealogy for the purposes necessary co-operation such as in irrigation or defence.

Despite regular conquering or grouping of ayllus, the individual ayllu would remain intact even after a break up of the group or empire to which it had belonged. This was largely because of their economic self-sufficiency. However conquering ayllus like the Inca, by building the collective state, gained economic and political power and developed into the ruling class, but in doing so they lost that self-sufficiency. This meant that the failure or defeat of the collective state meant the demise of the ruling class.

The Inca ayllus were based in Cuzco, the empire's capital, which was divided into Hanan-Cuzco (upper Cuzco) and Hurin-Cuzco (lower Cuzco). This separation, common with Andean ayllus is known as dual divisions. The two halves of the ayllu would from separate customs and rites and would form separate units in the army but would remain on good terms with each other socially, taking part in feasts and mock battles. Dual division was mostly religious and symbolic but had little economic relevance. When a ruler died, their chosen successor would receive all their political power and rights, while the ruler's other male descendants received all the monetary treasures. This process was called split inheritance.

Religion

While the Inca often tolerated or incorporated the religions of their conquered ayllus they also imposed a state religion upon them. The Inca empire was a theocracy in which the Inca king, Sapa Inca, was the descendant of Inti, the sun god. The Inca required tribute, especially before and after battle, to certain gods. Regular and general festivals punctuated the labors of the empire's subjects with food drink and entertainments. Inti Raymi, the festival of the sun god, lasted nine nights, during which Sapa Inca would provide Aqhachicha, a maize beer, to first Inti, then himself, then the nobles, and finally to all people who attended.

Education

The Inca used quipu (bundled knotted strings), for accounting and census purposes. Much of the information on the surviving quipus has been shown to be numeric data; some numbers seem to have been used as mnemonic labels, and the color, spacing, and structure of the quipu carried information as well. How to interpret the coded or non-numeric data remains unknown. However, some scholars still harbor hope that quipus recorded spoken language like a writing system.

Despite accounts kept on quipus, the Inca depended on oral transmission to maintain and preserve their culture. Inca education was divided into two distinct categories: vocational education for common Inca, and formalized training for the nobility.

Monumental architecture

A detail of an Inca stone work Inca architecture was by far the most important of the Inca arts, with pottery and textiles reflecting motifs that were at their height in architecture. The main example is the capital city of Cuzco. The breathtaking site of Machu Picchu was constructed by Inca engineers. The Inca constructed stone temples without using mortars yet the stones fit together so well that one could not fit a knife through the stonework. The rocks used in construction were sculpted to fit together exactly by repeatedly lowering a rock onto another and carving away any sections on the lower rock where the dust was compressed. The tight fit and the concavity on the lower rocks made them extraordinarily stable. Similar rockwork allegedly exists on Easter island. Some schools of thought contend that this similarity could be evidence for Inca voyages to Easter island. This hypothesis is rejected in the following quote from a Nova program where Dr. Jo Anne Van Tilburg" 'all archaeological, linguistic, and biological data' point to Polynesian origins in island Southeast Asia." In a related set of questions and answers, the architect Vince Lee said "I think that the answer to that is probably not. It's the sort of question you can never answer 100 percent in the negative. In other words, we can't prove that something didn't happen but to date a lot of excavation and study has been done on Easter Island. Absolutely no evidence has been found of visitation by Andean peoples such as broken pottery or stone implements or really anything else that would indicate the presence of Andean people here so I think it's very unlikely that these walls were built by Andean peoples or that they were influenced by Andean builders. But they are remarkably similar to some of the walls of Peru, especially these two examples, so I think that will forever remain somewhat of a question. I believe that the prevailing answer to date, which is that the Peruvians had nothing to do with them, is probably correct."

The Inca had an extensive road system which consisted of two main roads as described in the following quote by Cieza de Léon: "The Incas built two roads the length of the country. The Royal Road went through the highlands for a distance of 3,250 miles, while the Coastal Road followed the seacoast for 2,520 miles."


Ceramics, precious metal work, and textiles

The Inca had an extensive road system which consisted of two main roads as described in the following quote by Cieza de Léon: "The Incas built two roads the length of the country. The Royal Road went through the highlands for a distance of 3,250 miles, while the Coastal Road followed the seacoast for 2,520 miles."


Agriculture and farming

Coca leaves The Inca lived in mountainous terrain, which is not good for farming. To resolve this problem, terraces were cut into steep slopes, known as andenes, in order to plant crops. They also used irrigation. They grew maize, quinoa, squash, tomatoes, peanuts, chili peppers, melons, cotton, and potatoes. Though all of their agriculture was important, their main food source was potatoes, unlike the Maya and the Aztecs, whose main food source was maize. The Inca was the first civilization to plant and harvest potatoes. Quinoa was also a main crop. They would use their seeds to make different foods. The Inca were the first civilization to use the freeze-dry method of storage. They would leave potatoes outside in the cold, then stomp on them in the morning to push out the water, and allow them to dry in the sun. This process would be repeated 3 or 4 times, until the dried potatoes were ready for storage. At this point they were called chuño.

Mathematics and medicine

An important Inca technology was the Quipu, which were assemblages of knotted strings used to record information, the exact nature of which is no longer known. Originally it was thought that Quipu were used only as mnemonic devices or to record numerical data. The Incas had no iron or steel, but they had developed an alloy of bronze superior to that of their enemies and contemporary Mesoamericans. The Andean nations prior to the Incas used arsenical bronze at best. The Incas introduced to South America the tin / copper alloy which is today commonly associated with "Bronze Age" metallurgy.

Structure

Every male under Incan rule capable of military service was subject to draft for either the purpose of a single campaign or permanent service. Strict discipline offered punishment in the form of whipping or execution for abuse of civilians by the army while on the march. Officers consisted of two classes: the higher ranked officers were members of the ruling Inca caste, given position and exempt from tribute while lower ranked officers who commanded at most 50 men were natives promoted by higher ranking Inca and not exempt from service.