The founding legends
Two imaginary sources fuel the story of the appearance of the Incas. The first traces their origins to Titicaca, the sacred lake. The Sun, supreme god, having drawn his two children, Manco Capác and Mama Ocllo, from the waters, entrusted his golden staff of command to his son Manco Capác and ordered him to found a city at the point where it would penetrate the ground without resistance. The staff sank into the fertile soil of the Cusco valley. The second, more complex legend involves four brothers, the Ayars, who emerged from the Tamputoco cave in search of a promised land. Each heading a tribe, the four brothers fight battle after battle to establish their hegemony. The winner will be Ayar Manco or Manco Capác, the first of the thirteen Incas to administer the empire.
It is thought that the Incas, the Quechua people who imposed themselves on the ruins of the Tiahuanaco-Wari empire, came from the province of Cusco itself. In the sierra, regional groups were more numerous and fragmented, making them harder to pin down. There were the Collas and Lupacas around Lake Titicaca, the Canas and Canchis in the Cusco region, the Huancas near Huancayo, the Collaguas in Arequipa, the Chancas of the Apurímac who attacked the Incas relentlessly, the Huaylas in the Callejón de Huaylas and the Pocras of Huamanga, ancient Ayacucho. One by one, these proud warrior cultures were subdued and unified.
The founding victory came in 1438, when several regional ethnic groups under the leadership of Pachacutec (1400-1471) won an essential victory over the Chancas confederation at Yawarpampa. Pachacutec was responsible for the continuous expansion of the empire. His son, the 10th Inca Tupac Yupanqui (1471-1493) and his successor Huayna Capac (1493-1527) consolidated the territories. It was during this period that Inca civilization experienced the greatest expansion of its culture, technology and science, drawing on its own knowledge of the Andean region and assimilating that of the conquered states.
The Incas left a powerful legacy in these lands. They knew how to respect the beliefs of each people and integrate them into their own, which no doubt explains why this heritage is still palpable today. Despite Spanish domination, conversion to Catholicism, years of struggle for independence and governance, it sometimes seems as if the Incas were still here yesterday.
A society that is hierarchical in the extreme
The Inca genius is also that of a highly structured society that organized an empire and unified very diverse subjects. Here are the pillars:
The Inca or Sapa Inca. Reigning over the nobility and the people, who venerated him as the direct descendant of the Sun (Inti) and of Wiracocha, the creator god, the Inca exercised absolute power. Only the highest court dignitaries could speak to him. In addition to his legitimate wife, the Colla, he had an infinite number of favorites. The Inca was elected from among the Panacas, the royal lineages or ayllus . One of the tasks of the Panaca, when the Inca died, was to preserve the embalmed body and orally transmit his achievements and conquests to his successor - the Incas knew nothing of writing.
The nobility. To enter the Inca's court, you had to be a member of the Imperial Panaca, be born or have lived in Cusco and speak Quechua, belong to the upper caste of the groups subject to the empire, or have been granted this privilege by the Inca. The highest-ranking civil servants were those in charge of roads or food depots, or accountants, who used quipus (a system of ropes with coloured knots) for their work.
Theayllu. This is the basic unit of society, predating the Inca Empire. It was made up of families who shared a common ancestor, owned a specific piece of land, the marca, and recognized the authority of a chief, or curaca, in charge of sacred activities. Members of theayllu were not part of the nobility, but could be admitted for services rendered to the Inca. Eachayllu family owned a parcel of land divided into three parts: one for its own needs, and the other two to pay taxes to the Inca and the cult. This enabled the state to pay its civil servants and provide for the food needs of the empire's peoples in the event of calamities or natural disasters. In theayllu, meadows and woodlands were communal spaces exploited in common. Farming and infrastructure maintenance were collective tasks. The minka is still practiced today in Andean village communities to maintain roads, canals, etc. The inhabitants of theayllu owed each other mutual aid and assistance.
Manpower and population management. Thanks to his constant counting and inventories, the Inca knew the Empire's affairs inside out. The quipus made it possible to count the number of soldiers and workers, and evaluate the wealth generated by the work of the corvées and the resources needed to maintain the workforce. Peoples wishing to join the empire received "technical aid" through the intermediary of mitimaes, technicians on mission outside their community. Peoples hostile to the Incas ran the risk of being sent to regions far removed from their territory. In this way, populations from Amazonia were deported to the Andes, or vice versa. Each individual had to perform a specific task for the state for a specific period of time: the mita. In this way, the state was assured of having an available workforce for tasks such as road building and military service.
Religious power. Religious power was wielded by members of the nobility, including the Willac Umu, the Inca's relative in charge of sun worship at the Qoricancha. The religious hierarchy also included priests communicating with the mummies, those in charge of sacrifices (of animals, rarely men), diviners and acllas (women chosen for their great beauty, who resided in theacllawasi or "house of the chosen ones"). The mamaconas, aged over 50, were responsible for making ritual clothing and chicha, the traditional corn-based drink (alcoholic or non-alcoholic) that has survived to the present day. The supreme god of the Inca religion was Inti, the Sun, and Earth(Pachamama) and Moon(Quilla) were also worshipped, in addition to natural phenomena such as lightning, water, hills, etc., to which offerings had to be made. - to which offerings had to be made on pain of punishment. Every year, Cusco revives its Inti Raymi, a festival in honor of the sun, while many other cities also hold raymi. Yacu Raymi, the festival of water, is still alive and well in the central Andes. The Incas did not believe in heaven or hell, but in life after death. The Incas did not impose a new religion on conquered peoples, but made the cult of the Sun official.
Builders of genius
When we think of the Incas, we think of the incredible fortresses that blend into and dominate the landscape, testifying to geological, physical and architectural knowledge and extraordinary craftsmanship. It's hard not to be fascinated by the cyclopean walls with their multi-angled stones (on the Machu Picchu site, there's a stone with 32 angles!), so perfectly fitted that it's impossible to slip a sheet of paper into the interstices The finest example of this is the zigzag walls of Sacsayhuamán overlooking Cusco. In the Qoricancha, the temple of the Sun in the imperial city, the stones, cut in rectangles with a polished, slightly convex surface, have withstood earthquakes. In the Sacred Valley, you can also admire the mountainside terraces of Pisaq, the rock-encrusted fortress ofOllantaytambo and the canals of Tipón. The more secretive Choquequirao has yet to reveal all its secrets, partially covered by vegetation, but its 24 white llamas inlaid in the Andean terraces are a work of unprecedented precision. Near Lima, the Pachacamac site predates the Incas and has been preserved by them. There are many more sites to mention, but many are not adequately promoted or protected (such as Huanuco Pampa, or Cumbemayo near Cajamarca) or are barely emerging from the shadows(Waqrapukara in Cusco).
At the height of the Empire, the network of roads and paths reached 24,000 km (between 30,000 and 50,000 according to Hyslop in 1984). All religious and military centers were connected, as were food stores and cities. Designed for pedestrians and draught llamas, the roads were 5 to 10 m wide, and traversed the Andean heights and valleys: this extraordinary network bears witness to perfect social and economic organization. The rectilinear nature of the route necessitated the construction of numerous rope suspension bridges (made of plant fibre or reed) and stairways. Some of these bridges, such as the one at Q'eswachaka, south of Cusco, have been maintained over the centuries by communities using ancestral skills. Chasquis, messengers who transported quipus and foodstuffs at walking pace, took it in turns to travel these paths (armies, administrators, judges, etc.). It is said that they could travel from Cusco to Quito in 5 days. There are tambos along the routes. Surplus production was stored here for redistribution to peoples or armies in need. Peru's territory is littered with the remains of tambos, and this term is used in the composition of many place names, recalling their Inca origins. Despite the Spaniards' relentless efforts to destroy every trace of the Incas' glorious past, there are still many proud reminders of the genius of an empire built in less than a century. The remains of the Inca road network, known as Qhapaq Ñan, were inscribed on UNESCO's World Heritage List in 2014.
To learn more about Inca genius, we highly recommend a visit to the Larco Museum in Lima, which showcases all pre-Columbian civilizations, and the Pachacamac Museum. Cusco has its Museo Inka with some interesting pieces, as does the Manuel Chavez Ballon Museum below Machu Picchu. Apart from the quipus, which have retained all their mystery, and the qeros (traditional bowls), the Incas were less dedicated to handicrafts, ceramics and goldsmithing. The Incas are also, and above all, the heirs of earlier know-how.
