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
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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
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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 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 Bridges
The Incas also
invented the
crowbar, which
is an iron bar
used as a lever.
Incan doctors set broken bones
and even knew how to perform
brain surgery!
They also developed
medicines 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