Inca

Theme: Centralization and the “triumph of the human spirit”

Inca

Inca

• By the 13th Century, the Inca had established domination over the regional states in Andean South America

• In 1438, Pachacuti launched a series of military campaigns that greatly expanded Inca authority– Success bred success and the Inca empire expanded

• By the late 15th Century, the Inca empire covered more than 2,500 miles, embracing almost all of modern Peru, most of Ecuador, much of Bolivia, and parts of Chile and Argentina

Characteristics of a Civilization

• Intensive agricultural techniques• Specialization of labor• Cities• A social hierarchy• Organized religion and education• Development of complex forms of economic

exchange• Development of new technologies• Advanced development of the arts. (This can

include writing.)

Agriculture

Llamas

Terraced farm land

Agriculture

• Intensive agricultural techniques– Inca empire spanned many types of

environments and required terraces to make farmland out of the mountainous terrain

– Chief crop was the potato

– Herded llamas and alpacas for meat, wool, hides, and dung (used as fuel)

• “… every civilization represents a triumph of the human spirit.”

Social Hierarchy

Social Hierarchy

• In order to rule the massive territory and populations they had conquered, the Incas completely restructured much of Andean society– Relocated populations

– Reordered the economy

– Constructed an extensive transportation network

– Inculcated a state religion

Social Hierarchy

• Rulers

• Aristocrats

• Priests

• Peasant cultivators of common birth

Social Hierarchy

• Chief ruler was a god-king who theoretically owned everything and was an absolute and infallible ruler

• Dead rulers retained their prestige even after death– Remains were mummified and state

deliberations often took place in their presence in order to benefit from their counsel

– Were seen as intermediaries with the gods

Incan MummiesIncan Mummies

Social Hierarchy

• Aristocrats lived privileged lives including fine foods, embroidered clothes, and large ears spools– Spanish called them “big ears”

Inca ear spools

Social Hierarchy

• Priests often came from royal and aristocratic families

• They lived celibate and ascetic lives

• Influenced Inca society by education and religious rituals

Social Hierarchy

• Peasants worked lands allocated to them and delivered substantial portions of their production to the bureaucrats– Surplus supported the ruling, aristocratic, and priestly

classes as well as providing public relief in times of famine or to widows

• Also owed compulsory labor services to the Inca state– Men provided heavy labor– Women provided tribute in the forms of textiles,

pottery, and jewelry

Mit’a System

• a system whereby members of Inca extended families, or ayllus, performed mandatory public service

• meant that each person in Inca society had to at times help others, quite often with tending the herds, preparing the fields, or building the vast networks of roads which the Inca were well known for

Cities

Cities: Cuzco

• Inca capital at Cuzco served as the administrative, religious, and ceremonial center of the empire

• May have supported 300,000 residents at the height of the Inca empire in the late 15th Century

• Tremendous system of roads emanated from Cuzco

New Technologies

Major Roads of the Inca Empire

New Technologies: Roads

• Built an all-weather highway system of over 16,000 miles – Ran “through deep valleys and over

mountains, through piles of snow, quagmires, living rock, along turbulent rivers; in some places it ran smooth and paved, carefully laid out; in others over sierras, cut through the rock, with walls skirting the rivers, and steps and rests through the snow; everywhere it was clean swept and kept free of rubbish, with lodgings, storehouses, temples to the sun, and posts along the way.” (Ciezo de Leon)

New Technologies: Roads

• Allowed the Inca government to maintain centralized control by moving military forces around the empire quickly, transporting food supplies where needed, and tying the widespread territories together

• Rest stations were built a day’s walk apart

• Runners were positioned at convenient intervals to deliver government messages

Incan Suspension BridgesIncan Suspension Bridges

The Incas alsoinvented the

crowbar, whichis an iron bar

used as a lever.

Incan doctors set broken bonesand even knew how to perform

brain surgery!

They also developedmedicines from plants.

Economic Exchange

Inca gold

Economic Exchange

• Inca society did not produce large classes of merchants or skilled artisans

• Locally they bartered among themselves for surplus agricultural production and handcrafted goods

• Long distance trade was supervised by the central government using the excellent Inca roads

Economic Exchange

• Gold, the Inca’s most valuable commodity, proved to be their undoing when Spanish conquistadors destroyed much of the empire in the early 1500s in search of gold

• The Spanish melted down almost all the gold so few works of art remain

Arrival of Francisco Pizarro in South America

Specialization of Labor

Inca textile fragment

Specialization of Labor

• Large class of bureaucrats to support centralized government

• Much fewer skilled craftsmen than other people of Mexica and the eastern hemisphere– Some potters, textile workers, and tool

makers

Religion and Education

Inti Raymi, the feast of the sun

Religion and Education

• Main god was Inti, god of the sun– In the capital of Cuzco, some 4,000 priests, attendants, and

virgin devotees served Inti

• Sacrificed agricultural produce or animals rather than humans (llamas and guinea pigs)

• Inca religion taught that sin was a violation of the established or natural order– Believed sin could bring divine disaster for individuals and

communities– Had rituals for confession and penance

• Believed in life after death where an individual received rewards or punishments based on the quality of his earthly life

Art and Writing

Quipu (khipu)

Art and Writing

• The Inca had no writing

• Instead they kept records using a quipu– A array of small cords

of various colors and lengths, all suspended from a thick cord

– By tying knots in the small cords, Inca could record statistical information

586 on a quipu

Inca

• Empire implodes in 1525

• Ruler Huayna Capac died

• Two sons fight for control – civil war occurs

• Happens when the Spanish conquistadors were around