Spanish chroniclers documented Inca resettlement policies that effectively created diaspora communities in the pre-Hispanic Andes. Communities that were forcibly relocated were called mitmaqkuna; they were ethnically distinct groups in the places to which they were moved. The Inca ruler, Pachacuti, was the first to resettle potentially rebellious communities that lived in defensible locales (Sarmiento de Gamboa 1999 [1572]). In time, the Inca state more systematically relocated some ethnic groups to distant zones (under Huayna Capac, see D’Altroy 2002: 248), often placing these mitmaqkuna near those who spoke a different language, effectively preventing them from forming well organized rebellions against the state (Rowe 1946: 269). In other cases, the relocated population might be loyal to the Inca, so transplanting them as monitors of sorts prevented other subject (conquered) peoples from allying against the Inca (Rowe 1946: 269).
Additionally, subject and resettled communities constituted part of a vertical archipelago system in the Inca Empire, enabling the state (and ayllus) to control the production and distribution of foodstuffs and other goods (Murra 1972). These Inca state policies aimed at limiting rebellions and managing the deployment of resources through forced or encouraged movement of peoples have been discussed by other scholars (Bauer and Stanish 2001; D’Altroy 2002; Julien 2000), yet antecedents to these kinds of state policies remain less explored (but see Goldstein 2005), particularly from a bioarchaeological perspective.
The Middle Horizon states of Tiwanaku and Wari (see Chapter 37 in this volume), which originated in the southern and central highlands (Isbell 1985; Kolata 1993a; Schreiber 1992), each expanded to incorporate distant geographical zones. Tiwanaku and Wari may have originated the first state-sponsored or state-influenced migration and relocation policies in the Andes, colonizing distant zones and creating urban centers to which foreigners migrated. Identifying diaspora communities in the Middle Horizon illuminates the role that the earliest states played in the engineering of human migration. This is not to imply that ancient states dictated all aspects of population movement and settlement. Nevertheless, state policies and structures certainly would have profoundly affected where people lived, journeyed, died, and were eventually buried. Documenting these various phases through
Figure 34.1. Map of the south Central Andes showing key sites mentioned in the text and the terrain of the area discussed. (Drawn by Steve A. Wernke)
Combined archaeological, osteological, and archaeological chemical analyses can illuminate how state and community structures may have affected an individual’s life course.
World History
