The Inca Empire began with a small group of people who lived in crude homes and scrambled for food. They spent their earliest years defending their territory from invading enemy tribes and trying to eke out enough crops to last through droughts and famines. The first eight Inca rulers focused on Cuzco and its surrounding towns. In the early days, the Inca civilization consisted of a population of well under 10,000 people, and Cuzco under Manco Capac probably only had 500 residents.
The early history of the Incas is bound up with myths that are difficult to separate from facts. Recounting this history is made all the more difficult because the Incas had no written language, and oral history can sometimes change with the retelling. Still, there is a story of how the Inca civilization began.
Manco Capac and Mama Ocllo brought together the small tribes living near Cuzco. The tribes formed ayllus (clans) under the guidance of Manco Capac, the first Inca ruler. The ayllu system endured throughout the 300-year reign of imperial rule. Setting up a new city demanded constant attention and ensuring that the people had the basic elements of life: food, clothing, and shelter. The Incas had to build housing, till fields and plant crops, hunt, and find potable water. Manco Capac also built a sun temple, Intihuasi, so that the people of Cuzco could honor their primary god.
Blending the four tribes around Cuzco together was not difficult. The members of these tribes were farmers who had no interest in war. However, neighboring tribes were not as friendly. A significant achievement of Manco Capac’s reign was to provide a safe, secure home for his people and an heir to provide continuous leadership.
Sinchi Roca, Manco Capac’s heir, ruled from roughly 1228 to 1258. Among his first duties was to build a palace for himself and his family, servants, and guards. Each succeeding Inca chief needed to build a new home, as the mummified remains of earlier Inca rulers continued to reside in their original palaces, along with their families and servants.
Weaving History
Weaving is still important in the Andes, and weavers still use a backstrap loom, as the Incas did. The strap at the bottom of the loom is secured around the weaver’s waist to keep it stable.
Improvements needed to be made to the Intihuasi since the original, according to Spanish priest Bernabe Cobo, was “of humble and coarse adobe walls. . . because in those rustic times the people did not have a way to work stone as their descendants did later.” The temple served a dual purpose for the Incas, providing a place to worship and intimidating people of neighboring tribes, who were awed by the size of the temple. This was particularly true of civilizations that had no formal places of worship.
Cuzco’s location high in the Andes had a short growing season and a long winter. The growing population needed more food, and the responsibility to ensure higher crop yields fell to the Inca ruler. Sinchi Roca settled on two ideas that would help increase farmland: building agricultural terraces and draining the local marsh. Each of these projects consumed millions of hours of labor. Humans and llamas carried innumerable stones to form the terraced walls. Filling the terraces required thousands of baskets of topsoil, which then needed to be raked, seeded, weeded, and watered. Draining marshland was even more difficult, since sloped channels needed to be cut into the earth using rudimentary tools.
World History
