Ancient Cuzco

by Brian S. Bauer

  The Wari were certainly interested in the maize of the Cuzco region and most likely gathered large quantities of it through taxation on various local groups. It is worth repeating, however, that we currently know of no secondary Wari centers in the Cuzco Basin nor in the lower Vilcanota River Valley, both of which contain some of the finest maize-producing lands of the Andean highlands. This suggests that the Wari were content to establish some kind of negotiated relations with the elites of the groups that lived in the most important regions of maize production, rather than take direct control over these resources. On the other hand, the areas of the Lucre and Huaro Basins were completely transformed by the construction of the site of Pikillacta as well as a wide range of support facilities, including massive terraces and canal systems.

  Sometime after AD 900 the site of Pikillacta was abandoned and then burned. The collapse of Wari influence in the Cuzco region is mirrored at two other critical Wari centers. In the Wari heartland, the capital city of Wari itself appears to have been abandoned in mid-construction (Isbell et al. 1991). Likewise in the north, the site of Viracochapampa was abandoned soon after its construction was initiated. Perhaps the tributary demands of the empire, combined with generally degrading economic and environmental conditions, brought about and galvanized local resistance to state demands.

  As Wari influence declined in the Cuzco region, the balkanized political landscape filled with rival polities of various sizes and diverse ethnic identities. In the Cuzco Basin, some time between AD 1000 and 1400, a state developed and then extended its direct administrative control over numerous neighboring groups. It was during this period that the Inca were successfully able to consolidate their rule over the various and diverse ethnic groups of the Cuzco region to form a united heartland.

  The Inca’s largest and most powerful rivals were the Pinahua and Mohina of the Lucre Basin and the Ayarmaca of the Chinchero area, but a host of other ethnic groups of varying sizes were scattered across the region. The unification or, in a few cases, the successful elimination of these ethnic groups over the course of several centuries resulted in the creation of an Inca state and a heartland capable of sustaining rapid Inca imperial expansion. Less powerful neighboring ethnic groups accepted Inca administration early on, perhaps even initiating Inca patronage. This is most certainly the case with the small ethnic groups that lived to the south of the Cuzco Valley who were absorbed into the developing state early in the process. Strong rivals to Inca control maintained their independence, at times depopulating areas and settling in defensive sites to protect settlements and resources. This is clearly shown with the Pinahua and Cuyo, who lived, until their military defeat by the Inca, to the southeast and north of the Cuzco Valley respectively. Finally, groups of intermediate complexity used alliances and violence to align themselves with the strongest regional competitors. In many cases, marriages between elite families of different ethnic groups helped to promote stable, cross-generation coalitions. In time, most of the groups within the area came to see themselves as “Inca.” The ethnic integration of the greater Cuzco region was a critical phase in the cultural development of the region, and it later enabled these groups to expand into neighboring non-Inca regions. In other words, the processes of state development ran concurrent with the course of heartland formation.

  During the late 1300s or early 1400s, the Inca expanded beyond the Cuzco heartland. At this time of imperial development, the character of the Cuzco Valley was transformed as Cuzco became the capital of the largest empire of the Americas. A new pottery style developed that would form a time horizon across several thousand kilometers of the Andes, and a new imperial architectural style spread with the construction of provincial centers and other state facilities. Agricultural storehouses were built in the valley and other warehouses were constructed within the city to house the tribute items that were brought from all corners of the empire.

  At this time, the population of the Cuzco Valley dramatically increased as people were drawn to the capital from the provinces. Others were resettled in the valley as part of a massive pacification system of the Inca. Still others were brought to the valley as representatives of their ethnic groups, and they worked in the large public works projects that began to change the face of the local geography. Immense terrace systems were established, royal estates built, and numerous other new state facilities were constructed throughout the region. Among the greatest projects devised by the Inca in the Cuzco Valley was the construction of Sacsayhuaman. Although the site had been occupied in earlier times, during the imperial period it was greatly expanded. Thousands of workers toiled for decades to construct what is now one of the most impressive archaeological sites in the Americas.

  Within the city of Cuzco stood some of the most important buildings of the Inca Empire. They were largely clustered around the central plaza of the city. The most outstanding of these included the palaces of the last four Inca kings, the House of the Chosen Women, and a number of temples built to honor important deities. The central plaza area, once much larger than it is today, held a monolith and an offering basin near its center. It may also have contained a large round tower. The precise boundaries of the largest compounds in Cuzco, such as the Hatuncancha and Pucamarca, are still open to debate, since the available descriptions of Inca Cuzco are incomplete and contain many ambiguities. Additional archival research in Cuzco tracing the ownership of various Colonial Period houses and landholdings may lend some clarity to this situation.

  Of central importance to Cuzco was the Coricancha compound. From this compound radiated the four parts that made up the Inca Empire. The Coricancha contained a group of buildings set within large enclosure walls. The compound was among the first to be sacked by the Spaniards, and it provided much of the gold that was included in the ransom of Atahualpa. Although much of the Coricancha has been destroyed, a few of its buildings and walls have survived to mark what was certainly the most important compound within the Inca Empire.

  With the arrival of the Spaniards, followed by a series of wars between the Inca and the Europeans and then between the Europeans themselves, the character of Cuzco rapidly changed. Tragically, only five years after the Spaniards first entered the imperial city, Vicente de Valverde wrote to the king of Spain suggesting that much of the glory that was Cuzco had already been lost:

  . . . the organization of this valley was so beautiful in buildings and population, that it was a thing to be admired, because although the city had but only three or four thousand houses,1 [the valley] held more than twenty thousand people. The fort that was above the city was like the great forts of Spain. But now the greater part of the city is all demolished and burned. Nothing of the fort is intact.2 (Translation by author)

  The most notable Inca architectural features that remain in central Cuzco, and that so impress the visitors of our times, are the great compound walls that border many of the streets. Most of the interior buildings, which once numbered in the hundreds, were destroyed even before the devastating earthquake of 1650.

  The Cuzco Valley is one of the great centers of cultural development in the Americas. In this work I have attempted to provide a general outline of the long and complex social developments that occurred in and around the valley from the time of its first inhabitants to the fall of the Inca Empire. By necessity, parts of this work are speculative, and there is still much to be learned. A better-defined ceramic sequence and large-scale excavations are urgently needed to test and refine many of the suggestions put forth in this book. Unfortunately, with the rapid population growth and urban expansion of Cuzco, dozens of archaeological sites in the valley are being destroyed each year. There is little time left to collect information on the heartland of the Inca. Once the sites of the Cuzco Valley are destroyed, much of the history of the Inca, like their empire, will be lost forever.

  APPENDIX

  Radiocarbon Dates from the Cuzco Region

  NOTES

  1. Introduction to the Inca

&nb
sp; 1. The lack of archaeological research in the Cuzco Valley has been noted by various authors, including Niles (1984: 205), Murra (1984: 77), Conrad and Demarest (1984: 96), Burger (1989: 56), and Hyslop (1990: 29).

  2. The Quechua terms, toponyms, and personal names contained in this work are written according to their Hispanicized spelling as found in the Spanish chronicles and on modern maps. The English and Spanish plural s form is generally used in this text rather than the Quechua form (kuna or cuna). For example, I discuss huacas rather than huacakuna.

  3. The first geographic study of the Cuzco Valley was conducted by Herbert Gregory (1916) under the direction of Hiram Bingham. For additional information on the ecology of the valley, see K. Chávez (1977).

  4. “Conocí el valle del Cuzco adornado de innumerables árboles de estos tan provechosos, y en pocos años le vi casi sin ninguno; la causa fué que se hace de ellos muy lindo carbón para los braseros” (Garcilaso de la Vega 1960: 309 [1609: Pt. 1, Bk. 8, Ch. 12]).

  5. The best single source for seventeenth- and eighteenth-century events in Cuzco is Diego de Esquivel y Navia 1980 [1749]. For a summary of other early accounts of Cuzco, see Porras Barrenechea (1992).

  6. The Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris holds a collection of his drawings.

  7. Other noteworthy early reports on the city of Cuzco include Hill (1850), Marcoy (1875), and Middendorf (1895).

  8. For additional information on Squier’s photographs, see McElroy (1986). Some of Squier’s photographs are currently housed in the Latin American Library of Tulane University.

  9. For a more complete review of early archaeological research in the Cuzco region, see Rowe (1944: 8–9).

  10. For a summary of the publications produced by Bingham and his colleagues, see Bingham (1922: 347–351).

  11. For a detailed summary of research that took place in the Cuzco region between 1940 and 1968, see K. Chávez (1982: 207–214).

  12. Since the very first archaeological reports about the Cuzco region were published, researchers have struggled to define the ceramic sequence for the area (Uhle 1912; Bingham 1915; Jijón y Caamaño 1934). Not surprisingly, the earliest reports focused largely on Inca pottery. However, in the 1940s John H. Rowe began to develop a pre-Inca ceramic sequence for the area with test excavations at several sites in and near the city of Cuzco and exploratory visits to many other sites in the region. Building upon this work and on excavated data generated by the Cuzco archaeologist Manuel Chávez Ballón, in 1956 Rowe presented a prehispanic ceramic sequence for the region that included seven broad temporal-ceramic classifications. These classifications span, from latest to earliest: Classic Inca, Killke, Wari (Huari) and contemporary regional styles, Huaro, Derived Chanapata, Chanapata, and Marcavalle.

  2. The Inca Heartland

  1. As a prelude to the emergence of the four brothers and four sisters from the cave of Tamputoco, Guaman Poma first describes Manco Capac and Mama Huaco leaving Lake Titicaca and walking to Tamputoco (Guaman Poma de Ayala 1980: 63–65 [1615: 80–85]).

  2. Capac = royal.

  3. Capac apu = royal lord.

  4. “Que todo los que tienen orexas se llaman yngas, pero no son perfetos, cino son yndios pobres y gente uaja ni son caualleros, cino picheros. Destos dichos que tienen orexas, sólo uno fue rrey Ynga primero, Mango Capac. Por eso le nombró capac [poderoso]; que dezir ynga es común, no es rrey, cino capac apo quiere dezir rrey. Y ací fue primero el Ynga Mango Capac, el segundo, Anta ynga, Caca Guaroc ynga, Quiuar ynga, Masca ynga, Tambo ynga, Lari ynga, Equeco, Xaxa Uana ynga, Uaro Conde ynga, Acos ynga, Chillque ynga, Mayo ynga, Yana Uara ynga, Cauina ynga, Quichiua ynga” (Guaman Poma de Ayala 1980: 66 [1615: 84–85]).

  5. Millma rinre = term unknown.

  6. “En la ley de los Yngas se ordenaua para ser rrey, Capac Apo Ynga. Ynga no dezir rrey cino que ynga ay gente uaja como Chillque ynga ollero; Acos ynga enbustero; Uaroc ynga Llulla Uaroc mentiroso; Mayo ynga falzo testimoniero; Quillis Cachi, Equeco ynga lleua chismes y mentiras; poquis colla millma rinre; estos son yngas. Y ací no es señor ni rrey ni duque ni conde ni marqués ni caualleros yngas cino son gente uaja ynga y pecheros” [Guaman Poma de Ayala 1980: 96 (1615: 117–118)].

  7. Capac Apu Inca = Royal Lord Inca.

  8. Auquiconas = Nobles.

  9. Milma rinri = term unknown.

  10. “Cómo tenía sus uicios y horadamientos y costumbres antigos de los Yngas Capac Apo Ynga y de los otros yngas auquiconas y comunes yngas, Hanan Cuzco, Hurin Cuzco, Anta ynga, Tambo ynga, Queuar ynga, Uaroc ynga, Quillis Cachi ynga, Uaro Condo ynga, Lari ynga, Masca ynga, Acos ynga, Chillque ynga, Cauina ynga, Quichiua ynga, Yana Uara ynga, Chilpaca Yunga, Uro Collo, puquis colla, milma rinri. Cada uno conforme a su calidad se ahoradauan las orexas en su ley y serimonia que usuaron en tiempo del Ynga” [Guaman Poma de Ayala 1980: 310 (1615: 337)].

  11. For additional discussions concerning hierarchical kinship models for the Cuzco region, see Zuidema (1983).

  12. Guaman Poma de Ayala incorrectly places the Masca, Tambo, and Chillque groups in Collasuyu. There is, however, ample evidence to suggest that they were located directly south of Cuzco in Cuntisuyu (Zuidema 1983: 14; Poole 1984: 462; also see Bauer 1992a).

  13. “Auqui capac churi, príncipes deste rreyno, hijos y nietos y bisnietos de los rreys Yngas destos rreynos: don Melchor Carlos Paullo Topa Ynga, don Cristóbal Suna, don Juan Ninancuro, don Felepe Cari Topa . . . Son casta y generación y sangre rreal deste rreyno.

  Ingaconas señores caualleros Hanan Cuzco, Lurin Cuzco Yngas, tartarnietos y sobrinos y sobrinas, ñustas, prensesas: Casta rreal deste rreyno.

  Haua ynga, Uaccha ynga, Chinchay Suyo ynga, Anta ynga, Sacsa Uana ynga, Quilis Cachi ynga, Mayu ynga, Quichiua ynga, y sus mugeres, palla, aui: Son yndios tributarios.

  Anti Suyo ynga, Tambo ynga, Lare ynga y sus mugeres, palla, aui: Son yndios tributarios

  Colla Suyo ynga, Queuar ynga, Uaroc ynga, Cauina ynga, Masca ynga, Tambo ynga, Acos ynga, Chillque ynga, Papri ynga y sus mugeres, palla, aui: Son yndios tributarios.

  Conde Suyo ynga, Yana Uara ynga y sus mugeres se llaman ynaca aui y son yndios tributarios” [Guaman Poma de Ayala 1980: 690 (1615: 740)].

  14. “Y es así que al oriente de la ciudad, de la gente que por aquella banda [Manco Capac] atrajo, en el espacio que hay hasta el río llamado Paucartampu, mandó poblar a una y a otra banda del camino real de Antisuyu, trece pueblos, y no los nombramos por excusar prolijidad; casi todos o todos son de la nación llamada Poques. Al poniente de la ciudad, en espacio de ocho leguas de largo y nueve o diez de ancho, mandó poblar treinta pueblos, que se derraman a una mano y otra del camino real de Cuntisuyu. Fueron estos pueblos de tres naciones de diferentes apellidos; conviene a saber: Masca, Chillqui, Pap’ri. Al norte de la ciudad se poblaron veinte pueblos, de cuatro apellidos, que son: Mayu, Zancu, Chichapucyu, Rimactampu . . . El pueblo más alejado de éstos está a siete leguas de la ciudad, y los demás se derraman a una mano y a otra del camino real de Chinchasuyu. Al mediodía de la ciudad se poblaron treinta y ocho o cuarenta pueblos; los diez y ocho de la nación Ayarmaca, los cuales se derramaban a una mano y a otra del camino real de Collasuyu por espacio de tres leguas de largo, empezando del paraje de las salinas, que están una legua pequeña de la ciudad . . . los demás pueblos son de gentes de cinco o seis apellidos, que son: Quespicancha, Muyna, Urcos, Quehuar, Huaruc, Cauińa . . .

  . . . Ahora en nuestros tiempos, de poco más de veinte años a esta parte, aquellos pueblos que el Inca Manco Capac mandó poblar, y casi todos los demás que en el Perú había, no están en sus sitios antiguos, sino en otros muy diferentes, porque un visorey, como se dirá en su lugar, los hizo reducir a pueblos grandes, juntando cinco y seis en uno y siete y ocho en otro, y más y menos como acertaban a ser los poblezuelos que se reducían . . .” [Garcilaso de la Vega 1960: 32–33 (1609, Pt. 1, Bk. I, Ch. 20)].

  15. “Mas también fué con limitación del tamaño del horado de la oreja, que no llegase a la mitad de como los traía el Inca, sino de medio atr
ás, y que trajesen cosas diferentes por orejeras, según la diferencia de los apellidos y provincias. A unos dió que trajesen por divisa un palillo del grueso del dedo merguerite, como fué a la nación llamada Mayu y Zancu. A otros mandó que trajesen una vedijita de lana blanca, que por una parte y otra de la oreja asomase tanto como la cabeza del dedo pulgar, y éstos fueron la nación llamada Poques. A las naciones Muina, Huaruc, Chillqui mandó que trajesen orejeras hechas del junco común que los indios llaman tutura. A la nación Rimactampu y a sus circunvecinas mandó que las trajesen de un palo que en las islas de Barlovento llaman Maguey y en la lengua general del Perú se llama chuchau, que quitada la corteza el meollo es fofo, blando y muy liviano. A los tres apellidos, Urcos, Y’ucay, Tampu, que todas son el río abajo de Y’ucay, mandó por particular favor y merced que trajesen las orejas más abiertas que todas las otras naciones, mas que no llegasen a la mitad del tamaño que el Inca las traía, . . .” [Garcilaso de la Vega 1960: 35–36 (1609: Pt. 1, Bk. 1, Ch. 23)].

  16. Apocuracas = Lord Chiefs.

  17. Mancopchurincuzco = Cuzco Sons of Manco [Capac].

  18. Acacacuzcos = term unknown (see Zuidema 1977: 278, 279).

  19. Aylloncuzcos = Cuzco ayllus.