Andean Civilization

Conrad and Demerest’s book is most important not for any actual archaeological discoveries, but rather, it attempts to tackle many theoretical questions surrounding culture and history. However, the section on the Inca is very scant and the reasons for such must be elaborated. In their analysis of the Inca Empire they never even mentioned Wari as a pre-cursor, and they quickly brushed over Tiwanaku. My parents being from Bolivia, I have always had an interest in this part of the world, and I know that from 1958-1980 Bolivia put up much red tape around the site of Tiwanaku for foreign archaeologists, which would limit the base of knowledge with which Conrad and Demerest were working (not to mention the fact that Tiwanaku itself is probably only 20% excavated and above ground). Study of earlier civilizations has been able to shed further understandings about the Inca.

It seems that Andean civilization may have its earliest manifestations in the Caral-Supe complex (near Lima) at the very beginnig of the time line sketched by Conrad and Demerest. Through subsequent research another macro-state contmporaneous with Tiwanaku, Wari, is also known to have existed. An analysis of the archaeological data seems to have shown that though Cuzco was located in an area closer to Wari power, and though they adapted some of their technology and organizational ideas, they completely disavowed their ideological religious system and sought to align themselves with the Tiwanakutas. In the collapse of these two great formative civilizations it is unclear exactly what the causes were (though it may have been extended droughts) and evidence seems to point, in contradictory directions, that at least one political grouping attacked the other. Indeed, it seems that Wari, forming after Tiwanaku and falling before it, was largely a response to Tiwanaku’s centralization of power in the Titicaca basin of Western Bolivia (near La Paz). Wari seems to have had its main base at Pachacamac on the coast of central Peru (also near Lima). It is thought by some that the Wanka identified with Wari and that this may have been part of its antagonism towards the Inca. The shift in where civilization started in the Andes and where it reached it's highest point (the Inca) seemed to be linked with the development and collapse of Wari and Tiwanaku.

In order to best try and reconstruct Inca Civilization one should try to examine the larger overarching cultural complex of which they are but a constituent. This should involve examination of civilizational pre-cursors, such as above, and cultures resulting from a specific civilization’s evolution. Peoples who were contemporaneous, and are associated, with, the Inca Empire, are still around, such as: Aymara spaekers, Quechua speakers and Guarani speakers. A case example of living people capable of shedding light on pre-columbian practices is the Kallawaya medicine men. These medicine men supposedly served the Inca and still continue their service of travelling medicine men following ancient walking paths. They use a peculiar language to perform their trade, it appears to use vocabulary from several languages, most notably Pukina, an extinct language which has been linked by some to the people of Tiwanaku (Aymara has been linked to Tiwanaku as well). Another more enigmatic example are the Uru-Chipaya speakers, who seem to predate other living peoples, and who may well be linked to an altiplano filled with water during some of the earliest years of human inhabitance of the area and are linked to water. Some evidence seems to suggest that much of the Altiplano was at one time under water, perhaps even within the time of first human occupation of the Titicaca basin somewhere between 14,000-10,000 years ago.

History of the Inca, and the Andes in general, has become very interesting over the years. For instance, people aren’t even sure what language it is the Inca spoke, some suspect that for the commoners it was originally Aymara and switched to Quechua around the time of the defeat of the Wankas. Furthermore, some evidence seems to indicate that the Inca elite spoke a separate language from the masses, many think it was either Aymara or Pukina. I personally do not know too much about the Inca per se, I am more interested in Aymara speakers and their various political entities over the years, such as the Lupaqa and Collas mentioned in the text or the free state of Pacajes during the Spanish colonial period. However, it is obvious that in terms of the analysis of the Inca, though solid, the book is a bit dated and lacks much data that has since become available.