The Great Incas By Charlotte Fox

Introduction Many years ago, three great empires lived prosperously, each with their own special culture and achievements. These were the Maya, the Aztec, and the Inca empires. Although each civilization had their own good points, one stands out. The Inca civilization had the most important achievements. They managed a huge empire, had advanced inventions, created a road system, and even made their own language! And although there was good work all around, the Incas developed many things that we still use today. The Incas were obviously a very advanced society. Sources: History Alive textbook, chapter 27, pages 306 and 307, Google Images Key: Bolded words are key words in the text Bottom left image: Incan god carved out of gold Bottom right image: an Incan settlement

A Large Empire The first piece of evidence that shows that the Incas were advanced is that they maintained an incredibly large empire for a long time. At the height of their power in the early 1500s C.E., the empire stretched almost the entire length of the Andes mountain range. Their empire was 2,500 miles! The Incas managed their empire well for close to a century, and are remembered for it. One reason why they had such a unified, controlled empire is because of their bureaucracy system. They had many different layers of authority. “The various levels of officials were in charge of larger and larger groups within the empire. Through this system, Inca culture spread throughout their lands.” (History Alive textbook, chapter 27, page 306) Sources: History Alive Textbook, chapters 26 and 27, pages 290, 291, and 306, Google Images Bottom left image: map of the Inca Empire Bottom right image: the Incan settlement on Machu Picchu

Inventions The Incas made a great many clever inventions to solve the problems that they had. One of these was suspension bridges( thick rope bridges that stretched over rivers, with one end anchored to stone towers on either side of the river). These helped serve as a walkway across bodies of water. Another ingenious innovation of the Incas was a type of surgery called trephination. This involves puncturing the skull and removing all of the injured bone fragments against the brain. Usually the patient was an injured warrior, and many of them survived the operation. We still use a lot of the Inca’s great inventions today. The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco is a suspension bridge, for example. Sources: History Alive textbook, chapter 27, page 306, Google Images Bottom left image: a suspension bridge Bottom right image: trephination surgery

Road Systems The Incas relied on a system of roads to manage their vast empire. Some even say that this is how they kept their empire for so long. The roads stretched up, down, and across the lands, over going every obstacle. They carved steps and tunnels out of rock in mountainous terrains. As you already learned, they built suspension bridges over bodies of water. And last but not least, they created an extraordinary system of messengers, where people called runners where stationed at different places along the roads. They preformed a sort of relay race where one messenger would run along the road with their message and deliver it to the runner at the next station. Then that runner would run as fast as they could with their message, and so on until they reached their destination. This routine was very ingenious, and saved the large land of the Inca Empire from complete isolation between the different city- states. Sources: History Alive textbook, chapter 26, page 291, Google Images Bottom left image: an Incan road Bottom middle image: a mountain stairway for the messengers Bottom right image: roadways in the empire

The Tongue of the Incas The Incas spoke a language called Quechua. It was the official language of the empire, and they made it up themselves. Quechua spread far and wide throughout the empire. This is a big achievement because their language is still a part of our world today. Ten million people in South Africa still speak Quechua. The Incas had no written language. Instead, they had knotted sets of strings called quipus. These served as memory aids in sending messages and recording information. Sources: History Alive textbook, chapter 27, page 307, Google Images Bottom left image: a quipus Bottom right image: a quipus with different types of knot examples

The Incas are the Best Some people might say that the Maya had more important achievements because they developed the most complex system of writing, and built beautiful Mayan pyramids. However, although things like this are impressive, they aren’t still used today very much. The Incas made many inventions that are still used today, such as their language ( Quechua, used in some parts of South America ), or their suspension bridges (such as the Golden Gate bridge, or the Inca suspension bridge over the Apurimac River). These things have remained important for hundreds of years, and creating something that is still being used after the world changes significantly really shows a job well done. Sources: History Alive textbook, chapter 27, page 307, Don Jacobs, Google Images, Allabouttheincas.com Bottom left image: The Golden Gate suspension bridge Bottom right image: a tribe in South America that still speaks Quechua

Conclusion As you can see, the Incas obviously had the greatest and most important achievements. They kept a large and long-lasting empire, created suspension bridges and a type of surgery(trephination), devised a system of roads, and even developed their own language! The Incan civilization was the most advanced of the Maya, the Aztec and the Incas. Although every civilization produced good handiwork, the Incas were the best and had the most significant creations, especially since we still use so many of them today. Although the Incan civilization fell many years ago, many aspects of their culture lives on throughout today’s society, such as their language or their style of bridges. Information about Incan achievements have been preserved for years, and the importance of their creations has never been forgotten. Sources: History Alive textbook, chapter 27, page 306, Google Images Bottom left image: an architecturally advanced Incan settlement Bottom right image: an Incan gold carving of an Incan god