§83. The origin and history of the catacombs The catacombs of Rome and other cities open a new chapter in the history of the church, which was only recently brought to light from underground. Their discovery was just as instructive and important discovery, like the discovery long ago

Mythological origin and history of the Bon religion According to Bon mythological literature, there are “three cycles of propagation” of the Bon doctrine, which occurred in three dimensions: on the upper plane of the gods, or Devas (lha), on the middle plane of human beings (mi) and

Chapter One Origin, fate, history Gods did not always exist in the minds of the Egyptians. Religious texts more than once return to the idea that they could be born and die, that the time of their life and the existence of the world had a beginning and an end. If the story of the creation of the world has reached

§79. The origin of each person and in particular the origin of souls. Although all people thus descend from their first parents by natural birth: nevertheless, nevertheless, God is the Creator of every person. The only difference is that He created Adam and Eve

In the western half of South America, below the equator, on the vast plains between the Andes, lived an industrious people who created a large civilized empire. Its kings, called Incas, were descended from the sun. It was said that, taking pity on the miserable life of the savages of the country of Peru, the sun sent his children Manco Capaka and his sister, who was also his wife, to gather them into a comfortable society, teach them agriculture, the art of spinning and weaving, and other crafts necessary for a comfortable life.

The first parts of the country to which education was introduced by Manco Capac and his sister were the environs of Lake Titicaca, on the islands of which colossal temples of the sun and moon later stood, surrounded by sacred maize fields. The Inca people went to these temples on pilgrimage. To the north stood in the beautiful Andean valley the sacred city of Cusco, protected by surprisingly strong walls. It was the capital of the Inca king; it housed a magnificent temple of the sun, where pious Peruvians from all over the kingdom also came to worship. Like the Aztecs, the inhabitants of Peru did not know iron, but they knew how to build huge stone buildings. These were government buildings. The king called the people to build them. The mass of the population was enslaved by the aristocracy, whose members, actually called Incas, were considered to belong to the same clan. The head of this family was the king, whose rank was inherited by the eldest son or, if there were no sons, then to the closest relative, whose father and mother were people of the royal family.

The growth of the Inca Empire during the reigns of its various sovereigns

Inca kings

The Inca kings, sons of the sun, were considered sacred. They had unlimited power, appointed all rulers and judges, established taxes and laws, were high priests and commanders in chief. The nobles, the highest rank of which were the Incas, members of the royal family, observed forms of special reverence in relations with the king. The Peruvian aristocracy had a ritual similar to knighthood: a young man of noble birth knelt before the king; the king pierced his ear with a golden needle. On special occasions, the Inca king appeared to the people in magnificent clothes, woven from delicate vicuña wool, decorated with gold and expensive stones. He traveled frequently throughout the state; he was carried in a rich palanquin; he was accompanied by a numerous brilliant retinue.

In all areas of the state, the kings had magnificent palaces. Their favorite residence was Yucay, a rural palace in a picturesque valley near Cusco. When the Inca king "went to his father's dwelling," the entire population of the empire observed established forms of mourning. Precious vessels and expensive attire were placed in the king’s tomb, and his beloved servants and concubines were sacrificed on his coffin; the number of these victims is said to have reached several thousand people. Expensive things were also placed in the coffins of nobles; At their funerals, wives and servants were also sacrificed.

Social structure of the Inca Empire

All land of the Peruvian Empire was considered the property of the Incas. It was divided among people of all classes; the size of the plots was commensurate with the needs of the class, but only the lower class cultivated the land. In those villages that belonged directly to the government, a third of all products Agriculture and industry belonged to the king and his family; the other third went to the maintenance of churches and numerous clergy; the remaining third was divided annually in each rural community among householders in proportion to the number of souls in the family. Agriculture was under the patronage of the king. Products of agriculture and industry, including fine textiles made from vicuña wool, were stored in the royal stores and distributed as needed.

Taxes and duties in kind lay only on the commoners; the nobility and clergy were free from them. The commoner in the Inca Empire was obliged to work like a working animal, to properly perform the work assigned to him, without thereby improving his position, but was provided for from want. The people worked diligently under the supervision of overseers, the land was excellently cultivated, the mines delivered a lot of silver and gold; Bridges and stone roads were built along the main roads. Many of these structures were enormous; roads were carefully repaired; all areas of the state were connected by them with Cusco; mail went through them.

Inca city Machu Picchu

Inca conquests

The Inca Empire was peaceful. Its kings did not forget to take care of the good organization of the army, but they loved to conquer neighboring tribes not with weapons, but with the influence of civilization, industry, and through persuasion; in cases where they made conquests, they treated the conquered mercifully. The purpose of the conquests was to spread Peruvian worship and social order. Temples of the sun were built in the conquered areas; Numerous clergy settled at the temples; the land was divided into plots, the Peruvian work order was introduced; the crude dialects of the conquered were gradually replaced by the language of the Incas. In those areas whose population stubbornly resisted this influence, numerous Inca colonies were founded, and the former inhabitants moved en masse to other areas.

Scientists called amauta, were in charge of schools and kept chronicles of events using a special method of “knot writing” called pile. The tribes that lived near the initially small kingdom of the Incas were once hostile to it, but little by little they merged with the Peruvians into one people, having mastered the Peruvian language and submitting to the orders introduced among them by the Incas.

Sample of "knot letter" quipu

Serving the sun

The service of the sun in the Inca Empire was magnificent and almost completely pure from human sacrifice; they were produced only occasionally and in small quantities. Usually only animals, fruits, flowers, and incense were offered to the sun. Cannibalism disappeared among the Peruvians. Their main food was maize, bananas and cassava; They prepared an intoxicating drink from young maize trunks, which they loved very much. Another favorite pleasure of theirs was chewing coca leaves, which produce an effect similar to opium.

In the temples of the sun, an eternal sacred fire burned, which was maintained by the virgins of the sun, who lived like nuns. There were a lot of them. Some of them received the honor of becoming one of the wives of the Inca king. The king and nobles were allowed polygamy; but it seems that only one wife was considered legitimate.

The Inca Empire before the Spaniards

Such was the Inca Empire when the Spaniards, led by Pizarro, arrived to enslave him. They marveled at the carefully cultivated fields of the Peruvians, the beautiful products of their industry, the well-built houses, which usually had only one floor to prevent damage from earthquakes, but were spacious and comfortable; they marveled at the huge magnificent temples, the strong walls of the fortresses; They saw a hardworking, self-controlled people, meekly obeying the laws, which were considered the decrees of the deity.

The theocratic structure gave the state the character of an organism in which everything happens according to the law of necessity; every Peruvian was assigned his place in one caste or another, and he remained in it with submission to fate. Commoners lived according to the rules imposed on them by the higher castes, but for their lack of freedom they were rewarded with security from want.

Several civilizations are known to have existed in South America, but the most significant is the Inca civilization. In the fifteenth century, its population was at least six million people living over a vast territory. At the head of the Empire was the son of the Sun, Inca - the divine ruler. The economy was based on agriculture. All subjects were required to work for one month of the year. community service, building government facilities: fortresses, canals, bridges, roads. The state regulated all aspects of citizens' lives, including personal life. The Incas created legends, myths, religious hymns, epic poems and even dramatic works. This civilization did not have real writing, therefore from its cultural heritage little has survived. The Inca Empire fell with the arrival of conquerors from Europe in the mid-sixteenth century.

The Inca Empire (Quechua Tawantin Suyu, Tawantinsuyu, Tawantinsuyu, Tawantinsuyu, Tawantinsuyu) is the largest Indian early class state in terms of area and population in South America in the 11th-16th centuries. It occupied the territory from what is now Pasto in Colombia to the Maule River in Chile. The empire included the entire territory of present-day Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador (with the exception of part of the flat eastern regions covered with impenetrable jungle), partially Chile, Argentina and Colombia. The first European to penetrate the Inca Empire was the Portuguese Alejo Garcia in 1525. In 1533, the Spanish conquistadors took control of for the most part empire, and in 1572 the Inca state ceased to exist. There is a hypothesis that the last independent refuge of the Incas is the undiscovered city (country) of Paititi (until the middle or end of the 18th century).

Archaeological research shows that a large number of achievements were inherited by the Incas from previous civilizations, as well as from the neighboring peoples they subjugated. By the time the Incas appeared on the historical scene in South America, there were a number of civilizations: Moche (Mochica culture, famous for colored ceramics and irrigation systems), Huari (this state was the prototype of the Inca Empire, although the population apparently spoke a different language - Aymara), Chimu (center - the city of Chan-Chan, characteristic ceramics and architecture), Nazca (known for creating the so-called the Nazca line, as well as their underground water supply systems, ceramics), Puquina (the civilization of the city of Tiahuanaco with a population of about 40 thousand people, located east of Lake Titicaca), Chachapoyas (“Warriors of the Clouds”, known for their formidable fortress Kuelap, which is also called “ Machu Picchu of the North").

The Quechua name of the country, Tawantinsuyu, can be translated as the four united provinces (Tawantin - "group of four" (tawa "four" with the suffix -ntin meaning "aggregate"); suyu - "country", "region" or "province" "). As Quechuan linguist Demetrio Tupac Yupanqui points out: “-ntin - “all integrated,” “all that make up one whole.” The previous parts disappear to give way to one distinct integration - one whole. It creates what we whimsically call a “legal entity,” the subject and the responsible being distinguished by their constituent parts. It is as if there were one enterprise in which the legal entity assumes responsibility, thereby releasing the constituent parts.”

This name is due to the fact that the country was divided into four provinces: Kuntinsuyu (Kunti Suyu), Qulla Suyu, Anti Suyu and Chinchay suyu. In addition, four roads left Cuzco (Quechua Qusqu) in four directions, and each of them was named after the part of the empire to which it led.

In the Andean region and the adjacent coast in the 1st millennium BC. e. - 1st thousand AD e. developed agricultural civilizations of Chavin, Paracas, Nazca, Mochica, Tiahuanaco, etc. arose. In the 12th century, a people appeared on the shores of Lake Titicaca, led by the Inca, the supreme ruler. He moves to new capital- Cusco and spreads its influence over a vast territory, covering the XV-XVI centuries. most of modern Ecuador, Peru, a significant part of Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, as well as a small area of ​​Colombia.

The creation of the state is attributed to the legendary Inca Manco Capac, who also founded the capital - the city of Cusco, at an altitude of 3416 meters above sea level, in a deep valley between two mountain ranges.

After its creation, the country's territory constantly expanded. Especially after the Inca Yahuar Huacac created a regular army in the empire. Great conquests were carried out by Inca Pachacuti. He created a real empire, because before this the Incas were just one of the many Indian tribes, and Cusco was an ordinary town. Most of the Inca-controlled lands were conquered by Pachacuti and his son Tupac Inca Yupanqui. A small part of the territory was annexed by the eleventh Inca, Huayna Capac. The rulers Huascar and Atahualpa were sons of Huayna Capac. After his death, they began a grueling internecine war. When the Spaniards arrived, Atahualpa became the winner of the war.

When conquering neighboring tribes, the Incas, on the one hand, used their strong and numerous army, and on the other hand, attracted the elite of the conquered regions. Before taking military action, the Incas three times invited the rulers of the conquered region to voluntarily join the empire. They forced the conquered tribes to learn the Quechua language, imposed their customs and introduced their own laws. The local nobility and the priesthood of the conquered peoples retained their position, and the practice of local religions was not prohibited, subject to the obligatory worship of the imperial sun god Inti. The Incas attached great importance to the preservation of local folk crafts and costume, so that by the dress of any resident of Tawantinsuyu it would be easy to determine his origin and social status.

The Incas were characterized by the division of power and society into: warriors and non-warriors. The main generals and military leaders were either the rulers of the Empire or people appointed by them from the ruling ethnic group - the Incas. At the same time, it seems that there was still some kind of dual power - a full-fledged duumvirate: when economic activity The ruler (governor) of the city of Cusco was in charge of supplying and supporting the troops, as historian Juan de Betanzos repeatedly mentions.

At the peak of its existence, the Inca Empire was one of the largest states on Earth. The number of subjects of the empire reached, according to various sources, from 5-6 to 12 million people.

In 1521, Hernán Cortés conquered the Aztecs. This conquest inspired Francisco Pizarro. According to the report of Juan de Samano, secretary of Charles V, Peru first became known reliably in 1525 in connection with the completion of the first Southern Expedition of Francisco Pizarro and Diego de Almagro. The expedition left Panama on November 14, 1524, but was forced to return in 1525. After this, two more trips were carried out. In 1532, Pizarro arrived on the coast of modern Peru with 200 foot soldiers and only 27 horses. However, on the way, his army is replenished by those dissatisfied with the rule of the Incas. The Incas fiercely fight the conquerors, but the empire is weakened by internal turmoil and internecine war, in addition, a large number of Inca warriors die from smallpox and measles brought by the Spaniards.

By deception, Pizarro was able to capture and execute the Great Inca Atahualpa, after which the resistance was led by the military leader Rumiñavi for 2 years. The Inca capital, Cusco, was conquered by the Spaniards in 1536. Inca Manco Inca Yupanqui with a small number of followers hides in the mountainous region of Vilcabamba, where the Inca rule continues for about 30 years. In 1572, the last Inca ruler, Tupac Amaru, was beheaded. This marked the end of the Tawantinsuyu empire. The state was plundered, the Inca culture was destroyed.

In the book “Chronicle of Peru,” Cieza de Leon was the first European to ask the question of the reason for such an easy conquest of the Inca Empire:

Thus, although I have depicted Peru as three deserted and inhabited Cordilleras, out of them, as I related, by the will of God, there emerge valleys and rivers, beyond which people could in no way survive: this is the reason why local residents were so easily conquered and why do they serve without rebelling, because if they did that, they would all die from hunger and cold. Because (as I said), with the exception of the land they inhabited, most of it is uninhabited, these are continuous snow-capped mountains and amazingly high peaks.
- Cieza de Leon, Pedro. Chronicle of Peru. Part one. Chapter XXXVI.

The conquered Incas became part of the Quechua people. The result of the Spanish conquest was clearly noted by the same chronicler Cieza de Leon:

I do not approve of the overthrow of power in any way, but I still mourn the extortion and ill-treatment inflicted by the Spaniards on the Indians, enslaved by cruelty, regardless of their nobility and the high dignity of their people. Because of this, all these valleys are now almost deserted, but in the past they were densely populated, as many people know.
- Cieza de Leon, Pedro. Chronicle of Peru. Part one. Chapter LXI.

The empire was divided into 4 parts: Chinchaisuyu - red color corresponded to it, Kolyasuyu - blue color, Antisuyu - green color, and Kuntisuyu - yellow, in turn, each such part consisted of provinces:

north of Cusco were: Vilcas, Xauxa, Bombon, Cajamarca, Guancabamba, Tomebamba, Latacunga, Quito, Carangue ;

on the other side of Cusco, to the South: Atuncana, Atuncolla, Ayavire, Chuquiabo, Chucuito, Paria and others, stretching to Chile.

Each province had its own capital, where taxes were collected, where there was a temple of the Sun, foundries and jewelry workshops, a garrison, large inns, warehouses, as well as a representative of the Court - the governor.

Separately in administrative division, as the capital, the city of Cusco stood out. It was indicated in yellow. Each village, which was the capital of the province, had its own number. For example, to indicate that “Manco Capac, the first Inca ruler, conquered the first capital of the province, one large knot was introduced into the thread, two large knots were introduced into the second, and so on with all the others. It is known that Cuzco, the capital of the Empire, had three or four nodes, one above the other." It is also known that the distance of a province from the capital of the empire, Cuzco, was often made dependent on ordinal numbers: for example, the closer the province, the closer it or its curaca representative was to the Inca ruler in services, campaigns, rituals, and ceremonies.

To define the provinces of the Tawantinsuyu Empire in the Khipu script, each province had its own mixture of colored threads. On the thread, in turn, a red thread could be placed (inserted) to indicate those killed in one’s army “from/in such and such a province.” Also, the use of thread color for the provinces of the Empire was found in quipus related to the statistics and taxation of such provinces. The same system applied to reports on the geographical and economic description of the Empire.

Pedro de Cieza de Leon, in his Chronicle of Peru, reported on the unprecedented accuracy of accounting using quipus: “In each capital of the province there were accountants called quipucamayocs, and with the help of these nodes they calculated and recorded the necessary taxes paid by the inhabitants of that area, starting from silver, gold, clothing and livestock, and ending with firewood and other much more insignificant things; and with the help of these same quipus, after one year, or ten, or twenty, they notified the one who was entrusted with collecting the reports; and it was done so well that even a couple of alpargata could not be hidden.”

Cieza de Leon provided information about the number of positions of Quipucamayoc in a single territorial unit: “and in every valley this accounting is still available today, and always in the inns there are as many accountants as there are managers in it [the valley], and every four months they submit their reports in the above-mentioned manner." For the provinces, the deadline for submitting reports was set at 1 year, since “at the end of the year, each province ordered that all people, both those who died there that year and, accordingly, those who were born, be included in the pile according to the number of its nodes. And at the beginning of the year they were entering, they came to Cusco with piles, from which it became clear how many were born that year and how many died.”

In the vicinity of the village of Cotapachi in Cochabamba, there were 2076 collcas (rounded storage facilities), which is 22.09% of warehouse buildings out of the currently known 9395 units in the Inca Empire, that is, it was one of the strategic areas of the empire where the procurement and storage of provisions took place. The average diameter of the storage facilities in Cotapachi was 3.5 m, and the approximate height was 2 m, therefore, the volume of round storage facilities in the Cochabambe Valley could be 45,000 m3 (almost the entire volume was filled with provisions), which was a very significant figure even in relation to other provincial centers Inca Empire. In modern terms, this is comparable to 1,360 TEU (20-foot containers) that could fit on a Handymax Class container ship (1,000-1,700 TEU). In general, the scale of the Incas' warehouse economy was so large that it is quite comparable with our modern ones.

The absence of a distinguished layer of free artisans and the associated weak development of private exchange, the absence of trade and any kind of commercial intermediaries is a feature of Inca society, in contrast to the Aztecs. It is explained by the fact that in Peru the early despotic state appropriated the labor of the community members, leaving them with little surplus for exchange.

Coins
In general, coins were not used in domestic trade, but in foreign trade they circulated mulu shells, coca leaves, clothing, and copper hatchets. The Indians of the Chonos culture (Ecuador) back in the 15th-16th centuries smelted copper with a content of 99.5% and used it as a coin in the form of hatchets 2 cm on the sides and 0.5 cm thick. This coin was circulated throughout west coast South America, including in the Inca state in the province of Chincha, where 6,000 traders lived.

The Incas, or more precisely, the Inca, are an Indian tribe belonging to the Quechua language family. The tribe appeared in the 11th century, gaining a foothold in the territory of modern Peru. In the 15th century The Incas created the state of Tawantinsuyu and began to occupy a dominant position in it. This is how one of the ancient civilizations of South America arose. The Inca civilization was one of the most highly developed; Their household items and decorations amaze with their unsurpassed beauty, and the people themselves – with their hard work, talent, courage and energy.

The Inca's possessions covered more than 4000 km 2. The empire stretched across the Andean mountains, and its central part was located on the second highest (after the Himalayas) mountain peak of the Andes. The territories of modern Ecuador and Peru, Northwestern Argentina and part of Bolivia at that distant time were part of one of the great empires of the world - the Inca Empire. The number of peoples inhabiting Tawantinsuyu reached 10 million people - that's almost 100 ethnic groups.

From archaeological research it is known that on the Pacific coast of modern Peru, and in the mountainous areas (from Ecuador to Lake Titicaca in South America), various cultures appeared, developed and died out. The Incas themselves were originally a pastoral tribe that wandered, moving from Lake Titicaca to the north. On their way (not far from the northern borders of Bolivia) they found monumental structures and a small group of impoverished people.

Some archaeological finds indicate that before the 6th century. n. e. A new culture appeared in Tiahuanaco, which reached its peak in the 7th century. Apparently, the coastal cultures of Peru also contributed to its development. For about 3 centuries, the culture of Tiawanaku was the most highly developed of all that existed at that time on the American continent. But then its decline occurred, the reasons for which are still not clear. Various hypotheses have been put forward regarding this: a strong earthquake, an epidemic, the expansion of other tribes, etc.

The Incas adopted much of Tiahuanaco's cultural heritage, particularly its magnificent architecture. So, about 20 km north of Lake Titicaca there is a high sheer cliff, and below it is a monumental resemblance to a pyramid. In addition, ancient sculptors recreated in stone almost the entire animal world of the Andes and the Amazon Valley. Archaeologists have found a sculptural figure of a shaman holding in his hand the severed head of a wild beast; statues of jaguars and fantastic beasts, such as a lizard with the head of a puma.

Stopping in the Cusco Valley, the Incas founded a settlement here, which later became the capital of their empire. The settlement was founded by the Inca leader Manco Capac. He also became the first ruler. His title was called "Sapa Inca", and all the inhabitants of this territory began to call themselves Incas.

According to the beliefs of the Incas, the sun god Inti destined for them, his children, great mission to make cultural (for their time) people out of representatives of semi-wild tribes. The ruler of Pachacuti especially succeeded in this. He was a fairly ambitious man, and luck was with him. Pachacuti, in addition to annexing many tribes to the empire, also spread the Inca religion and culture among them.

An ancient Indian legend tells that on two islands - Copti and Titicaca - the son of the sun, Inca Manca Capac, and the daughter of the moon, his sister Mama Oklo, were born. Their christening took place, and at it the sun god gave the brother and sister each a golden staff and sent them to the north. Having reached the first valley, the Inca tried the ground with his staff, but came across a stone. He went further and continued to stick the staff into the soil until it went deep into it. This happened in the Cusco Valley. Then the Inca called to him shepherds from the northern environs, and his sister went south and brought the rest. Together they built main city empire, and in its very center a temple of the Sun was erected.

The next ruler, Tona Inca Yupanca, continued the work begun by Pachacuti, and as a result, one of the great civilizations appeared - the Inca Empire. Each of its new rulers adhered to a well-thought-out and effective system of government. When new lands were annexed to the empire, rulers left the conquered peoples with their leaders, local languages, and the ability to worship their gods. There was only one requirement: it was necessary to know the official language of Quechua, which was spoken only in Cusco. The Inca Empire was, perhaps, the only one in which relations between the peoples who inhabited it were built not on fear and violence, but on trust and cooperation.

When the Inca Empire reached its height and power, the population of its main city of Cusco numbered about 20,000 people. The sacred place of Cusco was the main square, or rather its center. The Incas brought soil from all over the empire, symbolically mixed it and placed it in the center of the square. This act confirmed the equality and unity of all inhabitants of the vast empire. The highest achievement of both Inca architecture and visual arts the temple of the sun appeared. Built of stone, it had gilded walls and a roof covered with gold slabs, and a spacious courtyard into which five main chapels opened. The first was the chapel of the sun god. Its front side was decorated with a huge golden disk, personifying the supreme deity and his governors on earth - the rulers of the Incas. The ceiling and walls were lined with pure gold. The nearby chapel was dedicated to the moon; accordingly, all its decoration was made of silver. The chapel intended for worshiping the stars was also made of silver, only the metal here was supplemented with precious stones. And finally, the fourth and fifth chapels were dedicated to the rainbow and lightning and were decorated with corresponding symbols.

The Incas were very skilled builders. Until now, the technology of their masons remains a sealed secret. In the same temple of the Sun, for example, slabs, not fastened with lime and laid one on top of the other, form high sloping walls. In the courtyard of the temple, a stone was found with very smooth walls and cylindrical holes drilled in it with a diameter of about 6 cm. This is all the more surprising considering that the Incas were not familiar with either steel or iron, i.e. those metals without which life is impossible. the profession of a modern mason.

There are practically no gaps between the stones from which the temples are built. Neither a needle nor the thinnest piece of paper can pass between them. The ability of the Incas to give stones complex geometric shapes is also amazing. Thus, individual stones (their front part) formed polygons with twelve sides.

Other buildings in Cusco were just as perfect as the Temple of the Sun. However, there is a version, supported by archaeological research, that construction skills was borrowed by the Incas from their predecessors. For example, ritual and public buildings in the city of Tiahuanaco, erected (as chemical analysis showed) in the 1st century. n. e., are distinguished by monolithic masonry. Even though the individual blocks weighed about 100 tons, they were cut and fitted with amazing precision.

One of the legends tells that Tiahuanaco was built either by gods or giants. The most impressive is the Gate of the Sun, made from a single stone block. The lintel of the gate is decorated with the figure of an unknown deity (which, however, can be found in other areas of the Andes) with large round and bulging eyes and a halo of snakes and cat heads. The deity holds staffs in his hands, on the top of one of them is the head of a condor.

In addition to the stonemasons of Tiawanaku, the builders who lived in the territory of Huari were unsurpassed masters of their craft. Perhaps they were the closest predecessors of the Incas in terms of urban planning. Having in their arsenal only cobblestones and a bronze crowbar, they erected buildings that have survived to this day, having withstood earthquakes more than once.

At Wari, stones were made of the same size, but their upper and lower surfaces were different. So, the upper surface was slightly concave, and the lower, on the contrary, convex. And when the stones were stacked on top of each other, they held very firmly due to the fact that the upper stone entered the cavity of the lower one with its convex back surface. Thus, by order of Pachacuti, palaces and temples were built in Cuzco. They were erected on the site of the demolished huts of the previous settlement.

The social structure of the Inca Empire was based on the principle of hierarchy. Each new ruler declared that he reigned by divine right, since he was a descendant of the sun god. The power of the Incas was hereditary. The Inca ruler, or emperor, had a harem of about a hundred concubines, but the empress - the coya - was chosen from among the ruler's sisters. In turn, the emperor chose his heir from the children and grandchildren of the Koyas.

In a number of cases, problems arose with inheritance. Thus, Pachacuti’s grandson, Huayna Capac, died of smallpox, without even officially becoming an heir. His own heir, Ninan Kuyuchi, also could not survive the epidemic. The survivors of Huascar and Atahualpa plunged the country into the abyss of civil war, which marked the beginning of the decline of the empire. As for the transfer of inheritance in everyday life, a man inherited from his father, and a woman inherited from her mother. Interestingly, succession to the throne did not automatically include inheritance of wealth. In this regard, the new emperor almost immediately set out on a campaign to conquer new lands and gain wealth.

For greater efficiency in government, all families in the Inca Empire were divided into groups consisting of ten families. Each of them chose a head, who reported to the heads of the groups, which already consisted of fifty families. Thus, groups appeared that included one hundred, five hundred or more families (their number could reach ten thousand). This system made it possible to effectively collect taxes, and in kind. These included food, various tools, weapons, clothing and shoes, and much more. All this was sent to warehouses (kamkas), and every day widows, orphans, sick and disabled citizens received everything they needed. Such an exchange (not only of knowledge and culture, but also of resources) allowed residents to feel protected and not be afraid of natural disasters.

A service of special inspectors was created to oversee the actions of local officials. No one knew where and when they would appear (these were people from among the noble Incas) to check the work of the local authorities. They were called tokoy-rikok, which translated means “those who see everything.”

The Incas did not have a written language; instead they used a quipu (literally “knot”) - a system of multi-colored laces with knots. All the nodules were recorded necessary information: the number of inhabitants of the empire (working and elderly), the amount of food (down to each grain barn) and much more. Wool laces different colors expressed different concepts. For example, red meant war or a warrior, white meant peace or silver, green meant corn, and yellow meant gold. One knot represented the number ten, two knots next to it represented twenty. The profession of the creators of the quipu (these people were called quipucamayocs) was very important in the Inca Empire, because the reliability of the entire state machine depended on the correctness of the recording. Kipukamajoki combined the qualities of an artist, a logistician and an accountant. How important the preservation and interpretation of statistical data was for the Incas is evidenced by the fact that the creators of the quipu enjoyed privileges, in particular they did not pay taxes, but at the same time they had a huge responsibility, since a mistake they made would lead to failure in work and provided for the death penalty as punishment.

Researchers have shown that the colored knots gradually developed into a complex three-dimensional writing system that resembled Braille for the blind. It turned out that the pile contains more than one and a half thousand individual characters. This is twice as much as the Egyptians and Mayans, and slightly more than the Sumerian-Babylonian writing. Mathematical research has shown that the quipu uses a binary system, reminiscent of the basis of a computer language.

The Incas created a whole network of roads with a total length of more than 240,000 km, which connected the most remote or inaccessible areas of the country. The mountain road through the Andes from Cusco to the current capital of Ecuador, Quito, is especially impressive. On wide highways, stations (tambo) were located at certain distances so that courier runners (chaskis) could rest and refresh themselves. Hardy people were chosen for this in their youth. They had to be able to run quickly in the thin air of the highlands. The constant attributes of the couriers were headdresses with flowing feathers and a twisted sea shell. Chaska, approaching the place where the next courier was waiting for him, blew into the conch and ran for a while next to his replacement, who memorized the contents of the message. This is how this kind of relay race took place.

The Incas showed themselves to be unsurpassed masters in creating a system of irrigation canals. It had no equal in terms of length and efficiency. The Incan irrigation structures survived centuries. It should be noted that the Incas adopted the principles of field irrigation from the Chimuor people they conquered.

The city of Chan Chan, the capital of the kingdom of Chimuor, was one of the most beautiful in South America. It was home to more than 36,000 inhabitants. Chimuora artisans made gold items that can be recognized as genuine works of art. When the Incas annexed Chimuor to their empire, they adopted to a large extent the skill and talent of this people and, to a certain extent, became disciples of their subjects.

The Inca fields were terrace-like systems, which were fortified on mountain slopes with stone bastions. The earth belonged to the Sun, the people and the emperor. A family Inca could claim a personal plot (tupa). A plot that belonged to the sun god could be allocated to a resident of the empire if he had an addition to his family. The land could not be sold; it was bequeathed only to children. The inhabitants of the empire cultivated the fields together. First of all, the lands of the sun god were subject to cultivation, then the lands of the poor, disabled, widows and orphans, then their own, and last but not least, the princely and royal allotments. In the same sequence, the harvest was collected and poured into public barns, which were divided into common ones and those belonging to the sun god. From the latter, bread was distributed to the army, officials and people performing public works. The part of the harvest that belonged to the sun god was associated with the costs of priestesses and priests. If the year was poor, the reserves of the sun god were used.

The common people did not have livestock; this was the privilege of the king and God. The Incas used llamas and alpacas as pack animals. The state itself took care of the animals. Thus, the Inca royal dynasty, like that of the ancient Egyptians and Chinese, was closely associated with agriculture.

The Incas were good doctors. They achieved especially great success in surgery, in particular in such a field as neurosurgery. During archaeological excavations Surgical instruments were found on the territory of Peru that were intended for trephination, that is, for opening the skull.

In order for the inhabitants of the empire to feel protected from natural disasters, famine and other extreme situations, the rulers ordered them to lead a regulated lifestyle. This primarily meant that no one spent time in idleness, everyone worked for the good of the empire. Only elderly people over 50 years of age were exempt from taxation and labor service. Nevertheless, they also participated in public works to the best of their ability. For example, they looked after children, cooked food, prepared firewood, or did some other simple work.

The Incas were extremely clean people. This trait was manifested in everything, from the cleanliness of the cities themselves to the housing of every inhabitant of the empire.

The Incas had a special inspection that checked whether the owner of the house complied with the established standard of cleanliness. On a certain day an inspection was scheduled, and at that time the reed mat over the front door had to be raised. The inspector watched the woman prepare food, clean the house, do laundry, and do any other work. The mistress of the house, who failed (in the opinion of the inspector) with her duties, was punished. In front of everyone watching, she had to eat all the dirt swept out of the house, and the owner had to drink the dirty water left after bathing all family members.

The Incas did not have divorces; all marriages they entered into were considered lifelong. This applied to both the nobility and the common people. The Incas did not have prisons, since any crime (violence, theft, robbery and other serious deviation from social norms) was immediately punishable by death.

The aristocratic part of society wore tunics: for women they were to the toes, for men they were to the knees. The tunic was tied at the waist with a belt with a heraldic sign. Sometimes the belt was replaced by a robe attached with pins. One of the main decorations of the Incas were large silver or gold discs that were worn in the earlobes. Their considerable weight pulled down the ears significantly.

The Incas had a school in which not only the sons of the nobility studied, but also the young children of the rulers of the conquered kingdoms. She was in Cusco. Students learned oratory, military affairs, religion, and some sciences (for example, history, geometry). The training ended with exams, in which sixteen-year-old young people were subjected to quite difficult tests, demonstrating their knowledge, strength, dexterity and courage.

The exams lasted about thirty days. They took place in open areas, and everyone could watch their progress. The test involved a six-day fast (those fasting were allowed to consume only water and herbs), followed by a 7.2 km race. The next test consisted of the ability to stand motionless while the fencer inflicted thrusts and cuts on the subjects. In addition, there was a more severe test of strength, when strong blows were inflicted on their arms and legs with whips made of vines. These actions tested the graduates' ability to withstand any pain. Anyone who could not stand it, showing signs of suffering through facial expressions or gestures, was immediately expelled. There were often cases of serious injury and even death during the exams.

The culmination of the tests was initiation former students knighted. The Inca ruler personally pierced the earlobes of the young men who knelt before him with a golden needle. Having received gold discs as signs of caste, young people (both the sons of the Incas and the sons of vassals - curacs) became representatives of the ruling class.

Girls were trained separately, this happened in monasteries. Special people ensured that the number of such girls in the empire reached a certain figure - no less than 15,000. Agents traveled to all regions of the country and, paying attention to the girl’s origin, her abilities and beauty, selected those suitable for training. Elderly mentors (mamakona) taught the pupils. Particular attention in the learning process was paid to the ability to dye fabrics and weave, since it was the girls who made thin fabrics (cumbi) from alpaca wool. These fabrics were used to make clothes for the emperor and his khoya.

Education at the monastery lasted 3 years, after which the emperor himself chose wives for himself and his nobles from among the pupils. Those of the girls who were not chosen became priestesses. They lived like noble ladies in the houses in the main square near the Coraxanga temple in Cusco and were universally respected.

The Incas attached great importance to holidays. First of all, during these days the connection between the people and the emperor was strengthened. In addition, during such events, people got rid of accumulated emotions, and finally the holiday was presented to the people as a gift for their hard work and loyalty to the emperor.

The ruler himself presided over the holiday. Firstly, his responsibilities included providing all participants with food and drinks; secondly, the program included musical performances, dances, exhibition fights, religious events - all this took place under his patronage.

One of the indispensable components of the holiday was the reading of poems in different genres. These were religious poetry, love ballads (usually about unrequited love), and heroic tales (about exploits). All this was passed on from mouth to mouth, supplemented by vivid descriptions of the valleys, mountain peaks and gorges. No less interesting was the musical performance, which consisted of dances (usually of a ritual nature), which were accompanied by mournful monotonous chants.

According to some sources, the Incas had about forty different dances. One of the most spectacular was the so-called jumping dance. It was performed by masked men, holding animal skins in their hands.

Inca music stood out primarily for its rhythmic diversity and richness. Hence they have a considerable number of different percussion instruments. These are large and small drums, as well as many flutes, representing a group of wind instruments. Flutes were made from animal bones or reeds, some were made from clay or condor feathers.

Particularly popular was the quena flute, carved from reeds and having eight finger holes. The musician alternately opened and closed them during the performance. In addition, the Incas often played flutes tied together.

In addition to flutes, the favorite instrument of the Incas was trumpets. There were even more of them than flutes, and they were made from wood, hollowed out gourds and sea shells.

Every month the Incas held three festivals. The most important of them took place in December - the first month of the rainy season. It was called kopak raymi, i.e. “big holiday”. During it (it was celebrated in Cusco), a rite of passage took place to initiate young men into men. The holiday was so seriously and strictly revered that only the Incas remained in Cuzco, and everyone else (not the Incas) left the capital at this time. At the end of the ceremony, they returned to the city again and confirmed their loyalty to the throne through the rite of communion.

To appease the gods, the Incas made human sacrifices. As a rule, these were children. The victim was then mummified; researchers managed to find more than four hundred similar ritual burials.

In 1995, archaeologists discovered a well-preserved ritual sacrifice, its historical age was about 500 years. It was a girl of 12–14 years old. Anthropologists conducted a lot of research on her, as a result of which they were able to find out the state of health, the diet of the Incas and a number of other details. This data was obtained for the first time since the victim was frozen, with preserved internal organs, and not a dried up mummy, as previous finds were. Interestingly, ritual figurines and several bright feathers were located on the top of the Nevada-Sabancay volcano near Cabanaconde (Peruvian village), and the body itself was in the crater of the volcano. Another intriguing fact was that before setting off on a difficult expedition, the American scientist Johan Reinhard and his guide Miguel Zarata offered corn beer to the spirits of the mountains. The ancient ritual worked and brought good luck to the anthropologist.

The Incas mummified the deceased rulers and their khoya. The composition that they used for embalming has not yet been clarified. After mummification (wrapping in fabrics made from the highest quality cotton, impregnated with the appropriate composition), the mummies were dressed in elegant clothes.

There were special servants who looked after the mummies, fed and watered them. The mummies even “went” to visit each other (servants carried them on stretchers) and to the emperor, attended holidays and were the first to “make” toasts. Caring for mummies was carried out at the expense of the state and was quite ruinous. Gradually this custom ceased to exist.

Scientific research has proven that there was no gold in the Andes, therefore, the Incas must have received it from other areas of the empire. And one of these provinces was the Amazon. Even before the arrival of the Incas, local tribesmen paved trails in the Amazonian lowland. The Incas connected them by building a network of roads that connected isolated and inaccessible areas.

A special feature of the Inca transport network was the presence of suspension bridges. They were made from ropes and woven mats and hung across rivers, gorges and chasms, some of which were up to 30 m wide. Some roads built by the Incas are still in use today. They are being restored and completed.

In addition to the various goods (tropical fruits, honey, colorful parrot feathers, etc.) that caravans consisting of numerous llamas brought to the Incan capital, the main product was gold. It was this that was the main reason why the main person in the Spanish campaigns of conquest, Francisco Pizarro, decided to personally undertake an expedition to South America to verify its existence.

Francisco Pizarro was a semi-literate military man. He participated in suppressing the rebellion of the Taino Indian tribe on the island of Hispaniola (now it is Dominican Republic) and Haiti. His first two attempts to enter the Incan lands ended in failure. But in 1527 he reached the city of Tulebes. Seeing temples decorated with precious metals, luxurious gardens with fresh flowers and their copies made of gold, Pizarro realized that the “golden land” was not fiction, but reality. He returned to Spain and told Charles V about the richest land, the simplicity and friendliness of its inhabitants. The king gave him the title of governor and captain-general of all the lands he would conquer in the future.

Pizarro recruited about 160 conquistadors. Charles V supplied them with muskets, crossbows, spears and cannons. In 1532, Pizarro and his team again arrived in the land of the Incas. Just at this time it flared up Civil War between Huascar and Atahualpa for holding the position of sapa inca (translated as “the only, unique Inca”). The Spaniards, even with such a small number, managed to defeat the Incas, weakened by civil strife and a smallpox epidemic.

Back in 1493, Columbus wrote about the cordiality and friendliness of the inhabitants of the New World: “They refuse nothing that you ask of them; on the contrary, they willingly share with everyone and treat everyone so kindly that they would be ready to give their hearts.” What a contrast with these lines about the character traits of the Incas are the intentions of the Spaniards as stated in the Requisition of 1509: “We will wage war against you with all the ways and means that we have; we will subject you to the church and its officials and force you to obedience; we will take you, your wives and children captive and enslave you!”

When Pizarro and a handful of adventurers first saw the thirty thousand Inca army, the Spaniards realized that they could not defeat them in open battle. Therefore, the conquistadors resorted to cunning. An agreement was reached that Atahualpa would greet the Spaniards as friends. But when the Great Inca, dressed in luxurious clothes sparkling with gold, accompanied by his military leaders, advisers and priests, came out to meet Pizarro, then, at a signal from the monk Valverde, the conquistadors jumped out of ambush, killed Atahualpa’s entire entourage, and captured the Inca himself.

In this terrible massacre, which Pizarro organized, 3,000 Incas were killed, and the rest fled in panic, because they saw that the one who was both king and god for them was taken prisoner. The Spaniards took advantage of the fact that Atahualpa’s retinue had no weapons, because a ceremonial meeting was being prepared.

Pizarro's team, meanwhile, did not lose a single soldier. The captive Atahualpa was kept in royal conditions, and in a short time he learned to speak Spanish. The smart Inca realized that gold might be for him the only way out to stay alive. He offered an unimaginable ransom for his life and freedom - a room measuring 7 by 6 m, which would be filled with gold just above the head of an adult.

The Incas were indifferent to gold in the sense that, unlike fabrics, it never had any material exchange value for them. They called gold “the sweat of the sun,” from which they made beautiful things, real works of art.

The Spaniards were amazed at such untold wealth. But with this proposal Atahualpa signed his own death sentence: the Spaniards again broke their word, and as soon as the ransom was received, Pizarro sentenced the Inca to death penalty– he had to be burned. Subsequently, the Spaniard replaced burning with death by hanging.

The Spaniards melted down the ransom for Atahualpa, eventually receiving over 6,000 kg of gold and almost 12,000 kg of silver. In the same way, by order of Charles V, all products made of precious metals made by Inca craftsmen were melted down. The Spaniards destroyed temples and palaces, and forced the inhabitants to work in mines and mines, lifting heavy objects high into the mountains. As a result, the country's population fell from 7 million to 500,000.

The surviving Incas, under the leadership of one of last kings- Manco - went into the jungle and built the city of Vilcabamba there.

It consisted of three hundred relatively small residential buildings and sixty majestic structures made of stone; roads and canals were built in the city. Periodically, the Incas attacked their enslavers, striking their outposts. This continued until 1572. When the conquerors decided to deal with the surviving Incas and came to Vilcabamba, they saw only ashes instead of the city. Manco's three sons, who took turns ruling the city after their father's death, burned it down before leaving. The last Inca leader, Tupac Amaru, was captured by the Spaniards as they carried out their punitive expeditions, going deeper and deeper into the jungle. Tupac Amaru was beheaded in the main square in Cusco. So the Inca Empire ceased to exist.

The descendants of the once great Inca Empire currently live in Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador. Their number is about 18 million people. Most of the inhabitants of these countries speak Quechua. Peruvians, Bolivians and Ecuadorians believe in the restoration of the former glory and power of the Incas. Schoolchildren in Peru know by heart all the rulers of the Inca Empire. Peruvians also believe that one of the sons of the sun, beheaded by the Spaniards Inkarr, according to legend, will return to them and restore their former civilization. Even foods that were once part of the Incan diet are now becoming more and more popular. These are amaranth, araksa, nynyas, oka, cherimoya, etc.

Tawantinsuya (“the land of four quarters,” as the Incas themselves called their domain) demonstrated the will and intelligence of its people, who created a highly developed civilization in less than a century. And this despite the fact that the Incas did not know wheeled vehicles or writing. The birth, development, flourishing and fall of the Inca Empire were like an explosion, the echo of which has survived to this day.