Dedicated to my favourite teacher Rebecca Boehm, from her favourite student, whom she will miss dearly after giving her a 90% in her ancient civilization course. :')

Preview audio:

storyj.mp/adqz94yq622t

Psst! Down here! It's me Poco the friendly parrot! Squak! Are you ready for a new adventure? Great! Today, I'll be teaching you all about the Inca Dynasty where we'll meet a gal named Manqu and learn all about the Quechua people and their land. Follow me! It begins in 12 AD in this cave right here, I can hear Manqu and her siblings already. Oh Golly gee! Don't squeak!

Once upon a time in a far away land, called Pacariqtambowas, a little girl named Manqu popped out of a cave along with her 2 brothers and 3 sisters. They had nothing with them but a gold staff.

We can get out of here from over there! Come on!

Can you see anything Manqu?

They were told to plunge it into the ground as they wandered from place to place and so they did! They were to settle where the gold staff disappeared deep deep DEEP into the ground!

Along the way, one of the brothers was sent back to the cave to retrieve some things they had left there. His brother sent a man along with him to walk him into the cave. The brother turned himself into a mountain, Wanakawri, now one of the most sacred places in the Inca empire.

Here!!

Oh my goodness, now what?!

Meanwhile, the remaining brothers and sisters found the land they were looking for in Cuzco as the gold staff sunk deep, into the ground. This is where the second brother turned into a stone.

But uh oh! The land they had found already had people living there. Mama Waqu, one of the sisters, decided to put one of the inhabitants to sleep and pulled out his lungs! She blew into them to inflate them like a pretty balloon. The people were so terrified that they all ran away!

Let's get out of here!!

*Gasp*

OW! You're hurting me!!

With the early inhabitant gone, the Inca Empire became the largest in the New World thanks to Mama Wanqu! It gradually built into a massive kingdom through the military strength of their emperors. It stretched some 4000 km from north to south along the western edge of South America. That’s 43 744 football fields!

The Andes Valley where the Inca (Manqu, Mama Wanqu and the third sister) lived had the best climate and some of the most fertile soil in the New World. This is one thing that helped make it and keep it successful for so long. The climate was warm and wet in both the northern part of the empire and in the coastal plain of Ecuador, while cold and dry in the southern part (south of Lake Titicaca).

The backbone of the territory was the Andean mountain chain and the rolling grasslands that were useful for herding llamas and alpacas! Overall, the land was suitable for the domestication of animals and a variety of plants such as: chili peppers, gourds, cotton, tropical fruits, beans, manioc, cacao, potatoes, maize, avocados, llamas, alpacas guinea pigs, and many other root vegetables!

Look at all my alpacas and llamas! I use Kipu, a record keeping method, to record information about numbers of livestock & agricultural produce. Kipu can also be used for calculating the total population census. I know that the empire has around 6-12 million people!

Historians are still not entirely certain of the Inca belief system but bits and pieces of information can help us put together some of the things they believed! The Inca had tarot cards and palm readings just like we have today. It is also known that they believed in reincarnation and very little occurred in the Inca society without some sort of ceremony or ritual sacrifice. They believed in the god Viracocha being the creator of the moon, stars & earth. The most important to them was the sun god, Inti.

An example of a ritual they did was having priests light fires early in the morning and throw corn on them to toast. The priests then had to urge the Sun to eat the corn and this helped people remember that they were the Sun’s Children. This may have been done to ensure the sun would rise again and again!

Religion in general was used as a unifying and controlling force. The Inca rulers promoted their own gods as well as the gods of their few conquered territories. This was a way to promote the government, as well as a way to make peace with the people they had captured during their military conquests. It allowed the rulers to expand the empire easily without many revolts.

The Emperor was the head of religious hierarchies. The Inca emperors used religion to legitimize their power! They had the commoners work their land, claiming it was the land of the sun god. This greatly influenced the power that the emperors and the gods had over the Inca people.

Get to work. Chop chop! Inti and I said so!

Shortly after 1438 BCE, a nationwide tax system was developed. This brought together the power of the emperor. Everybody was required give him money. This further legitimized the dynasty government and the Inca as a civilization! Taxes began in the Inca Empire in the form of labour not exactly like today.

The Inca citizens gave the Emperor animals, food, or worked the crops of state lands. This taxation influenced how the people viewed the emperors. It gave the rulers more power since the people felt that they owed them their labour. This tax system made the empire incredibly wealthy! The people never really owed the emperors money so the economy was strong and their wealth lasted for a long time. Smart people!

Pottery was eventually used as a state tax as well. Fun fact! A majority of the vases and bowls would have repetitive patterns which later influenced the pattern of future coinage. But shh they don't know this yet! These patterns were decorative and simple to do over and over again. Afterwards, the Incas gradually built platform mounds like the one he is standing on. These constructions represented a variety of architectural styles. Some emphasized huge patios bounded by lateral mounds while others incorporated a sunken circular court into the patio!

This will do too!

The construction of these mounds demonstrates the ability of the Inca to produce an architectural form that embodied the community’s beliefs. The focal building of others was a small room with a ceremonial hearth in the centre, which most likely functioned as a sweat lodge. Hot hot!

Teamwork!!

The Inca were able to coordinate large amounts of architectural work like bridges, all the way up the tall mountains. These bridges connected neighbouring towns and also allowed for communication between them and the Emperor with all the people he reigned over! It also allowed for expansion of the empire and made travelling with weapons or supplies up and down the tall mountains much easier. The less sweating the better! Am I right boys!

I heard you met a special someone!

Yeah, she's great. You wouldn't know her, she's from across town. Met her on the nearby bridge.

Although the economy, the art and the architecture was developing and prospering, the unity between the people was not! All the people who lived in the region were called Quechua just like the language, but there was a division between the Quechua people in the north and those of the south. Boo hoo :(

You are from the north!

Yes, be in awe you measly southerner!

Want to know why?! Well an indigenous chronicle says that the people of the north were seen as fierce because they ate maize, while those in the south were seen gentler because they ate potatoes! Then, the Inca viewed the people of the eastern lowlands as savages, and the lowlanders inferior. This division of the classes led to an unequal division of land, furthering the power the emperors had.

We are the people of the south, we are as gentle as the versatile potatoes we eat!!!

We are the people of the corn in the north, we are fierce!, hear us roar!!! *ROAR*

Speaking of power! Squak! The earliest Inca armies were made up of volunteers and they had no organized fighting strategies or phalanxes! But the Inca military were very peaceful, they did not participate in many battles. They even used conquest and peaceful assimilation to incorporate in their empire a large portion of western South America, centred on the Andean mountain ranges! They also wore cotton armour. Comfy!

They Inca armies did not have to fight often though. They used the geography of their hand-picked land to their advantage to become powerful! Since the Inca empire was surrounded by deserts and jungles, these acted as natural barriers isolating the Inca from surrounding empires. If there were any battles, they took place in open fields and the sling was the long-range weapon of choice! Ouch!

An example of how the Inca used their land to their advantage is with their bridges! Remember those?! Well some of the mountains were connected with rope bridges so whenever the Inca were under attack, they burned the bridges to keep the enemy or enemies from entering the empire without breaking a sweat! The less sweat, the less ruffled feathers! That makes for a happy Poco.

The Inca were wary of the coastal people, especially those on the northern coast of Peru where the Chimu kingdom had strongly resisted Inca conquest. In northern Peru, the Inca included the Chachapoyas region in their empire, a mountainous outlier of the Andes that extends into the Amazon basin.

BEWARE.

WE RESIST

#NoFear

You've previewed 25 of 39 pages.
To read more:

Benefits:

Full access to our public library
Save favorite books
Interact with authors

READ

Dedicated to my favourite teacher Rebecca Boehm, from her favourite student, whom she will miss dearly after giving her a 90% in her ancient civilization course. :')

Preview audio:

storyj.mp/adqz94yq622t

Once upon a time in a far away land, called Pacariqtambowas, a little girl named Manqu popped out of a cave along with her 2 brothers and 3 sisters. They had nothing with them but a gold staff.

We can get out of here from over there! Come on!

Can you see anything Manqu?

They were told to plunge it into the ground as they wandered from place to place and so they did! They were to settle where the gold staff disappeared deep deep DEEP into the ground!

DOWNLOAD
LIKE

(1)
COMMENT

(1)
SHARE
SAVE

BUY THIS BOOK (from $7.59+)

BUY THIS BOOK
(from $7.59+)
BUY THIS BOOK
(from $7.59+)
DOWNLOAD
LIKE (1)

Liked By

COMMENT (1)
SHARE
SAVE
Report

Encourage this author

BUY
LIKE

(1)
COMMENT

(1)
SHARE

Excessive Violence
Harassment
Offensive Pictures
Spelling & Grammar Errors
Unfinished
Other Problem

"The Storybook of Fun: Inca Dynasty"

studentm

Poco the parrot narrates an adventure through the Inca Dynasty, introducing a girl named Manqu and the Quechua people. The story covers the empire's rise, its culture, beliefs, economy, and eventual fall to the Spanish.

(39 pages)

Privacy level: PUBLIC

33 reads 1 fan

Report