THE INCA EMPIREOriginally Posted by Rex_Pelasgorum
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The Inca had three origin myths. In one, Ticei Viracocha of Colina de las Ventanas in Pacaritambo sent forth his four sons and four daughters to establish a village. Along the way, Sinchi Roca was born to Manco and Ocllo, and Sinchi Roca led them to the valley of Cuzco where they founded their new village. There Manco became their leader and became known as Manco Capac.
In another origin myth, the sun god Inti ordered Manco Capac and Mama Ocllo to emerge from the depths of Lake Titicaca and found the city of Cuzco. They traveled by means of underground caves until reaching Cuzco where they established Hurin Cuzco, or the first dynasty of the Kingdom of Cuzco.
In the last origin myth, an Inca sun god told his wife that he was lonely. She proposed that he create a civilization to worship him and keep him company. He saw this as a wise plan and carried it out. The Inca were born from Lake Cuzco and populated the Andes and worshipped their sun god.
The myths are transmitted via oral tradition, since the Incas did not have writing. There probably did exist a Manco Capac who became the leader of his tribe. The archeological evidence seems to indicate that the Inca were a relatively unimportant tribe until the time of Sinchi Roca, also called Cinchi Roca, who is the first figure in Inca mythology whose existence is supported by physical evidence.
The Inca people began as a tribe in the Cuzco area around the 12th century. Under the leadership of Manco Capac, they formed the small city-state of Cuzco (Quechua Qusqu), shown in red on the map. In 1438, they began a far-reaching expansion under the command of Sapa Inca Pachacuti, whose name literally meant "world-shaker". During his reign, he and his son brought much of the Andes mountains (roughly modern Peru and Ecuador) under Inca control.
Pachacuti reorganized the kingdom of Cuzco into an empire, the Tahuantinsuyu, a federalist system which consisted of a central government with the Inca at its head and four provincial governments with strong leaders: Chinchasuyu (NW), Antisuyu (NE), Contisuyu (SW), and Collasuyu (SE). Pachacuti is also thought to have built Machu Picchu, either as a family home or as a summer retreat.
Pachacuti sent spies to regions he wanted in his empire; they brought reports on the political organization, military might and wealth. He would then send messages to the leaders of these lands extolling the benefits of joining his empire, offering them presents of luxury goods such as high quality textiles, and promising that they would be materially richer as subject rulers of the Inca. Most accepted the rule of the Inca as a fait accompli and acquiesced peacefully. The ruler's children would then be brought to Cuzco to be taught about Inca administration systems, then return to rule their native lands. This allowed the Inca to indoctrinate the former ruler's children into the Inca nobility, and, with luck, marry their daughters into families at various corners of the empire.
It was traditional for the Inca's son to lead the army; Pachacuti's son Túpac Inca began conquests to the north in 1463, and continued them as Inca after Pachucuti's death in 1471. His most important conquest was the Kingdom of Chimor, the Inca's only serious rival for the coast of Peru. Túpac Inca's empire stretched north into modern day Ecuador and Colombia.
Túpac Inca's son Huayna Cápac added significant territory to the south. At its height, Tahuantinsuyu included Peru and Bolivia, most of what is now Ecuador, a large portion of what is today northern Chile, and extended into corners of Argentina and Colombia. However, it should be noted that most of the southern portion of the Inca empire, the portion denominated as Collasuyu, was desert wasteland.
Tahuantinsuyu was a patchwork of languages, cultures and peoples. The components of the empire were not all uniformly loyal, nor were the local cultures all fully integrated. For instance, the Chimú used money in their commerce, while the Inca empire as a whole had an economy based on exchange and taxation of luxury goods and labour (it is said that Inca tax collectors would take the head lice of the lame and old as a symbolic tribute). The portions of the Chachapoya that had been conquered were almost openly hostile to the Inca, and the Inca nobles rejected an offer of refuge in their kingdom after their troubles with the Spanish
CHIMU
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The Chimú were the residents of Chimor with its capital at the city of Chan Chan in the Moche valley of Peru. Chimor was conquered 50 years before the arrival of the Spanish, so there were plenty of survivors from pre-Inca times to dictate the particulars of the daily life of the Chimú before their conquest by Inca Tupac Inca Yupanqui. Chimor grew out of the remnants of the Moche culture; initially, Chimú pottery had some resemblance to Moche pottery.
An Andean bronze bottle made by Chimú artisans from circa 1300 A.D.
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An Andean bronze bottle made by Chimú artisans from circa 1300 A.D.
The Chimú are best known for their distinctive monochromatic pottery and fine metal working of copper, gold, silver, bronze, and tumbago (copper and gold). The pottery is often in the shape of a creature, or has a human figure sitting or standing on a cuboid bottle. The shiny black finish of most Chimú pottery is not achieved by using glazes, but instead is achieved by firing the pottery at high temperatures in a closed kiln which prevents oxygen from reacting with the clay.
The largest Pre-Columbian city in South America, Chan Chan is an archaeological site located in the Peruvian region of La Libertad, just north of Trujillo. Covering an area of approximately 20 km², Chan Chan was constructed by the Chimor (the kingdom of the Chimú), a late intermediate period civilization which grew out of the remnants of the Moche civilization. The vast mud city of Chan Chan was built between c.850 and c.1470 and was the imperial capital until Chimor was conquered by the Inca in the 15th century. It is estimated that 30,000 people lived in the city of Chan Chan.
The city is composed of ten walled citadels which housed ceremonial rooms, burial chambers, temples, reservoirs and some residences. Each of these citadels has a rectangular configuration with a north-facing entrance, high walls, and a labyrinth of passages.
Reliefs of fish in the Tschudi Complex, Chan Chan
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Reliefs of fish in the Tschudi Complex, Chan Chan
The walls themselves were constructed of adobe brick, and were then covered with a smooth cement into which intricate designs were carved. There are two styles of design present in these carvings: one is a ‘realistic’ representation of subjects such as birds, fish, and small mammals; and the other is a more graphic, stylized representation of the same subjects. While earlier civilizations concentrated on cat-like and anthropomorphic forms, the Chimú style shows a preference for maritime motifs. The carvings at Chan Chan depict fish, pelicans, and nets for catching various sea creatures. Chan Chan, unlike most other coastal ruins in Peru, is located extremely close to the Pacific Ocean.
Pelican carvings, Chan Chan, excavated in 2004
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Pelican carvings, Chan Chan, excavated in 2004
Chan Chan was added as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1986. The city is severely threatened by erosion from El Niño, which causes heavy rains and flooding on the Peruvian coast. Present-day visitors to Chan Chan can enter the Tschudi Complex, believed to be one of the later citadels built in the city. There are also several other Chimú and Moche ruins in the area around Trujillo.
THE CHACHAPOYAS (WARRIORS OF THE CLOUDS)
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The Chachapoyas, also called the Warriors of the Clouds, were an Andean people living in the cloud forests of the Amazonas region of present-day Peru. The Incas conquered their civilization shortly before the arrival of the Spanish in Peru. When the Spanish arrived in Peru in the XVI century, the Chachapoyas were one of the many nations ruled by the Inca Empire. Their incorporation to the Inca Empire had not been easy, due to their constant resistance to the Inca troops. The name Chachapoya is in fact the name that was given to this culture by the Inca; the name that these people may have actually used to refer to themselves is not known.
Since the Incas and the Spanish conquistadors were the principal sources of information on the Chachapoyas, unbiased first-hand knowledge of the Chachapoyas remains scarce. Writings by the major chroniclers of the time, such as El Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, were based on fragmentary second-hand accounts. Much of what we do know about the Chachapoyas culture is based on archaeological evidence from ruins, pottery, and other artifacts.
The chronicler Pedro Cieza de León offers some picturesque notes about the Chachapoyas:
"They are the whitest and most handsome of all the people that I have seen in Indies, and their wives were so beautiful that because of their gentleness, many of them deserved to be the Incas' wives and to also be taken to the Sun Temple (...) The women and their husbands always dressed in woolen clothes and in their heads they wear their llautos, which are a sign they wear to be known everywhere."
Cieza adds that, after their annexation to the Inca Empire, they adopted the customs imposed by the people from the department of Cuzco.
The meaning of the word Chachapoyas is unknown. It may have been derived from sacha-p-collas, the equivalent of "colla people who live in the woods" (sacha = wild p = of the colla = nation in which Aymara is spoken). Some believe the word is a variant of the Quechua construction sacha puya, or people of the clouds.
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Geography
Valley of the Marañón between Chachapoyas (Leymebamba) and Celendín
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Valley of the Marañón between Chachapoyas (Leymebamba) and Celendín
The Chachapoyas' territory was very extensive. They were located in the northern regions of the Andes in present-day Peru. It included the triangular space formed by the confluence of the rivers Marañón and Utcubamba in the zone of Bagua, up to the basin of the Abiseo river. The ruins of Pajatén are located here. This territory also included land to the south up to the Chontayacu river. In this way it exceeded, in a southerly direction, the limits of the current department of Amazonas. But the center of the Chachapoyas culture was the basin of the Utcubamba river. Due to the great size of the Marañón river and the surrounding mountainous terrain, the region was relatively isolated from the coast and other areas of Peru, although there is archaeological evidence of some interaction between the Chachapoyas and other cultures.
The contemporary Peruvian city of Chachapoyas derives its name from the word for this ancient culture as does the defined architectural style. Garcilazo de la Vega noted that the Chachapoyas' territory was so extensive that,
"We could easily call it a kingdom because it has more than fifty leagues long per twenty leagues wide, without counting the way up to Muyupampa, thirty leagues long more (...)"
The league was a measurement of about 5 kilometers.
The area of the Chachapoyas corresponds to a region that, being part of a mountain range because of its land, was characterized for being covered by dense tropical woods. Thus, it came to be referred to as the Amazonian Andes.
As fast as the population was growing, the forests of the Amazonian Andes were felled in order to expand agriculture. Tropical forests were thereby diminished drastically and the soil eroded, no longer being protected by its ancient green mantle. Nowadays, the Amazonian Andes resembles the barren landscape of the Andean moorlands.
The Amazonian Andes constitute the eastern flank of the Andes, which were once covered by dense Amazon vegetation. the region extended from the cordillera spurs up to altitudes where the forests have not been felled, usually above 3500 m.
The cultural realm of the Amazonian Andes occupied land situated between 2000 and 3000 m altitude. This means that they are limited to the altitude occupied by the Chachapoyas, attested to by the location of architectural remains.
Chachapoyas' Origin
According to the analysis of the Chachapoyas's objects made by the Antisuyo expeditions of Amazon Archaeology Institute, the Chachapoyas do not exhibit Amazon cultural tradition. Their cultural goods have Andean roots. Although in certain cases they present a particular physiognomy, the investigations show that it is only a question of forms that suffered modifications due to geographical factors and a probable relative isolation.
The anthropomorphous sarcofagi do not seem to be another thing than the imitation of funeral bundles provided with a wooden mask proper of the so-called Horizonte medio, when it reigned culturally on the coast and the highlands what is known as Tiahuanaco-Huari or Wari culture. The "mausoleums" are equally modified expressions from the chullpa or pucullo, architectural element of funeral character that has a big diffusion in Peru and also inserted in the cultural frame Tiahuanaco-Huari.
If we look for an answer to the question: why people who live in the mountain range of the Andes occupied zones of the Amazonian Andes, the reason will be that such occupation was an answer to the need of extending the agrarian border. This need can only have its explanation in the geographical enviroment, not only from the Andes but also from the coast, characterized by its extensest desert areas that are translated in suitable soils for agriculture, limited and insufficient to sustain a population like the ancestral Peruvian people. People dedicated, for three thousand years, to the intensive growing of the land and, for this reason, had supporting a increasing demographic rate.
This dissertation has received the epithet of "serranización of the rainforest", that is seen in both: the geographical part and in the cultural one. On one hand, when the scenery of the Amazonian Andes changed, after the fell of the tropical forests, into a barren one that resembles the mountain range of the Andes; and, on the other hand, when the Andean people carried their cultural Andean baggage to places that were originally filled with Amazon verdant grove. This phenomenon, which is still current, repeated itself in the southern Amazonian Andes in times of the Inca Empire, with the mountain projection to the zone of Vilcabamba that raised haughty Inca architecture exponents like Machu Picchu.
Incorporation to the Inca Empire
The conquest of the chachapoyas by the Incas took place, according to Garcilazo, during the government of Tupac Inca Yupanqui in the second half of the 15th century.
He recounts that the warlike actions began in the slope of Pias. If this is true, it was to the south-west of the Gran Pajáten, from what it is deduced that the area of Pias was already considered as a chachapoyas' territory.
About the resistance that the chachapoyas put up against the Inca's penetration in times of Tupac Inca Yupanqui, there is abundant historical information, especially in the chronicle of Cieza.
During the sovereign Huayna Capac's government, the chachapoyas rebelled:
"They had killed the Inca's governors and captains (...) and (...) soldiers (...) and many others were imprisoned, they had the intention to make them their slaves."
As an answer, Huayna Capac, who was in the Ecuadorian cañaris land and while he was gathering his troops, sent messengers to negotiate peace. But again, the chachapoyas "punished the messengers (...) and threatened them with death".
Then Huayna Capac ordered to attack them. He crossed the Marañon river over a bridge of wooden rafts that he ordered to be built probably in the surroundings of Balsas, next to Celendín.
From here, the Inca's troops went to Cajamarquilla (Bolivar), with the intention of destroying this town that was "one of the principal towns" of the chachapoyas. From Cajamarquilla, an embassy integrated by women went out to meet them. In front of them there was a matron, who was an ancient concubine of Tupac Inca Yupanqui. They were asking for mercy and forgiveness, that the Inca granted them. In memory of this event of peace consecration, the place where the negotiation had taken place was declared sacred and closed so from now on "(...) neither men nor animals, nor even birds, if it was possible, would put their feet in it."
To assure the pacification of the chachapoyas, the Incas installed garrisons in the region. They also arranged the transfer of groups of villagers under the system of mitmac, or change of territories of human groups:
"(...) it gave them grounds to work and places for houses not much far from a hill that is next to the city (Cuzco) called Carmenga."
Of the inca presence in the territory of Chachapoyas remain the architectural rests of Cochabamba, placed in the outskirts of Utcubamba in the current district of Leimebamba.
The architectural model of the chachapoyas is defined by the circular tendency of their constructions and the masonry of regular stones. Their constructions are also characterized for being raised on platforms that were constructed in slopes. Their walls are, in certain cases, decorated with symbolic figures. It is necessary to add the colossal character of some monuments such as Cuélap and other numerous enclosures, like Olán.
It might indicate that the chachapoyas constructions date back to the IX or X century, and that their architectural tradition was still current until the arrival of the Spanish to their territory in the second third of the XVI century. The exceptions were those constructions that were erected by the Incas using their own style, such is the case of the ruins of Cochabamba in the district of Leimebamba.
The presence of two funeral patterns are also typical from the Chachapoyas culture. One of them is represented by sarcophagi, placed vertically and located in caves that were excavated in the highest place of the precipices. The other funeral pattern was groups of mausoleums; that is to say "mansions for deceased people". They were constructed like tiny houses and were located in caves worked in cliffs.
The chachapoyas' ceramics did not reach the handmade level of the Mochica's or Nazca's. Their small pitchers are frequently decorated by cordoned motives. As for the textile art, cloths were generally colored in red. A monumental textile, proceeding from the precincts of Pajatén, showed that had been painted by figures of birds. The chachapoyas also used to paint their walls, since a haughty present sample in San Antonio, province of Luya, reveals. These walls stages a ritual dance of couples that were held by the hands.
Although there is archaeological evidence that people began settling this geographical area as early as 200 C.E. or before, the Chachapoyas culture is thought to have developed around 800 C.E. The major urban centers, such as Kuélap and Gran Pajaten, may have developed as a defensive measure against the Huari, a Middle Horizon culture that covered much of the coast and highlands.
In the fifteenth century, the Inca empire expanded to incorporate the Chachapoyas region. Although fortifications such as the citadel at Kuélap may have been an adequate defense against the invading Inca, it is possible that by this time the Chachapoyas settlements had become decentralized and fragmented after the threat of Huari invasion had dissipated. The Chachapoyas were conquered by Inca ruler Tupac Inca Yupanqui around 1475 C.E. The defeat of the Chachapoyas was fairly swift; however, smaller rebellions continued for many years. Using the mitamaq system of ethnic dispersion, the Inca attempted to quell these rebellions by forcing large numbers of Chachapoya people to resettle in remote locations of the empire.
When civil war broke out within the Inca empire, the Chachapoyas were located on middle ground between the northern capital at Quito, ruled by the Inca Atahualpa, and the southern capital at Cuzco, ruled by Atahualpa's brother Huascar. Many of the Chachapoyas were conscripted into Huascar's army, and heavy casualties ensued. After Atahualpa's eventual victory, many more of the Chachapoyas were executed or deported due to their former allegiance with Huascar.
It was due to the harsh treatment of the Chachapoyas during the years of subjugation that many of the Chachapoyas initially chose to side with the Spanish colonialists when they arrived in Peru. Guaman, a local ruler from Cochabamba, pledged his allegiance to the conquistador Francisco Pizarro after the capture of Atahualpa in Cajamarca. The Spanish moved in and occupied Cochabamba, extorting what riches they could find from the local inhabitants.
During Inca Manco Capac's rebellion against the Spanish, his emmissaries enlisted the help of a group of Chachapoyas. However, Guaman's supporters remained loyal to the Spanish. By 1547, a large faction of Spanish soldiers arrived in the city of Chachapoyas, effectively ending the Chachapoyas independence. Residents were relocated to Spanish-style towns, often with members of several different ayllu occupying the same settlement. Disease, poverty, and attrition led to severe decreases in population; by some accounts the population of the Chachapoyas region decreased by 90% over the course of 200 years after the arrival of the Spanish.
QUITO
There is relatively few info about it, but it seems it had an important role in the northern areas:
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A Millennial History
During the first millennium, nomadic communities hunting for animals and foraging for food arrived in the rich and fertile valley of Quito. Over time, tribes settled and Quito became an important settlement and major trading centre known as 'Tianguez.' Quito evolved into a cross-roads of cultures, and the most important economic centre in the northern Andes.
During the 16th century the Incas extended their area of influence from Peru and, following various battles, asserted their control over the Quito region. They established Quito as their key administrative centre from which to control the territories of their northern Empire.
The Spanish thirst for new land and riches brought them across the oceans to the Americas. The meeting of the two cultures proved cataclysmic. By the time the Spaniards arrived in what is today Quito, they found only ashes and ruins: the Inca general Rumiñahui razed the city rather than let the Inca kingdom fall into Spanish hands.
THE MAPUCHE or ARAUCANS
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The Mapuche people were the first inhabitants of half of the area today known as Chile and Argentina. Before the Spanish arrived in 1541, the Mapuche occupied a vast territory in the A Southern Cone of the continent and the population numbered about two million. At present they number approximately 1.5 million (constituting over 10% of the total population) in Chile, and two hundred thousand in Argentina. The Mapuche nation now constitute the third largest indigenous society in South America.
THE DIAGUITA
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The Diaguita, also called Diaguita-Calchaquí, are a group of South American indigenous peoples. The Diaguita culture developed between the 8th and 16th centuries in what are now the provinces of Salta, Catamarca, La Rioja and Tucumán in northwestern Argentina, and in the Atacama and Coquimbo regions of northern Chile.
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Diaguita tribes were sometimes confederated, and sometimes at war against each other. When the Inca started extending their empire southwards during the 15th century, the Diaguita fiercely resisted the invasion.
They were unique at the time for their lack of a caste system, and lack of gold or other sumptuous goods. They tended to live in clans. For the most part the men were monogamous, with chiefs possibly practicing bigamy.
They later fell to the Incas, though the influence of the Incas was successfully stopped at the Córdoba mountains. Their surviving descendants contributed to organized resistance to the Spaniards.
Diaguita peoples were one of the most advanced Pre-Columbian cultures in Argentina. They had sophisticated architectural and agricultural techniques, including irrigation, and are known for their ceramic art. They preferred the colours white, red and black. They mostly did not build large cities, but were sedentary farmers raising maize, pumpkins and beans, and herd animals such as llamas. They reflected the Andean culture they shared with the Inca. They worshipped the Sun, thunder and lightning.
THE AGUARUNA
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The Aguaruna (or Awajún) are an indigenous people, whose cultural practices and language is very closely related to the Shuar (or Jivaro). Historically, they lived primarily on the banks of the Marañón River, a tributary of the Amazon in northern Peru near the border with Ecuador. Currently, they possess titled community lands in four of Peru's regions: Amazonas, Cajamarca, Loreto, and San Martin. According to Peru's 1993 Census the Aguaruna numbered aproximately 45,137 persons.
Their real origin is still a mystery. In accordance with the racial characteristics of the majority, some anthropologists suppose that they went down the Andes centuries ago and adapted themselves to the geographical conditions of the region. Others believe that they are emigrants of Central America who came either by the coast or through rivers. They established themselves in a zone much wider than the one they occupy now. Apparently this zone also included the actual Jaén. It is also said that they had the influence of cultural groups that were immigrant from the islands of Melanesia.
They always had the reputation of being brave warriors, standing out for their skills in war. Physically there are differences between the aguarunas and other inhabitants from the Peruvian rainforest. Their average height is taller – especially between men – and their physical constitution denotes strength.
The aguarunas handle a traditional ideological and material culture, and they communicate each other in their own language. For this reason, there is a book called the Vocabulario aguaruna del Amazonas (Aguaruna's Vocabulary of the Amazon) written by Mildred L. Larson and published by SIL International in 1966. The aguarunas are located in the geographical area of the Marañón river, that is to say in the banks of the Marañón river and of its tributaries, the rivers Santiago, Nieva, Cenepa, Numpatakay and Chiriaco.
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The aguarunas' families, either monogamous or polygamous, are placed in dispersed form, grouped in extensive families or forming major magnitude towns.
Examples of the last case constitute the towns of Yutupiza on the Santiago river and Japaime on the Nieva.
In the cases in which exist a pattern of nucleate population, these towns, called in their native language yáakat, are not provided with streets, neither footpaths, nor squares, being constituted by housings of traditional construction. These houses are distributed in a kind of asymmetric form and the tendency is usually to be placed in a linear form along the river.
Another typical aspect of the aguarunas consists on the fact that they have traditionally worked as a seminomadic population, due to the poverty of the agricultural soil and the extremely elementary agrarian traditional technology, which brings as a consequence the depletion of the ground in a short period of two or three years.
Traditionally they used a spear perfected with pijuayo (palm tree of very hard wood) and the blowpipe for hunting. At present the spear has been almost completely displaced by the shotgun of pellets but they keep on using the blowpipe.
From the hunting pieces, they use the meat, the leather, the skins, the feathers, the teeth and the bones. That is to say, with a double purpose: nutritive and, also, handmade, medicinal and a witchcraft purpose.
They gather wild fruits of some palm trees, like the uvilla and some shrubs. Also buds of palm trees, stems, barks and resins. They extract the leche caspi and gather the honey of wild bees, eatable worms (suris) and coleopterous. Finally, medicinal plants and lianas. They use everything gathered in feeding, in some crafts, in traditional medicine, in witchcraft and as fuel, inside an ancestral pattern of self-sufficiency.
As agricultural instruments, they use the traditional tacarpo (stick with sharp top, made of wood from the palm tree called pijuayo); together with the axe, the machete and the shovel.
The principal crafts are masculine activities like the ropemaking, the basketry, the construction of canoes, the textile; feminine activities like the ceramics and the making of necklaces made of seeds, of insects' small wings and beads. The males make crowns of exquisite feathers as well as cotton ribbons in whose ends they places feathers and human hair. These adornments are kept in cartridges of bamboo.
Between the aguarunas, there is the traditional institution of mutual help known in their language as ipáámu, which works principally in the construction of young couples' housing, in the cleanliness of the small farms and, with less frequency, in sowing the yuca and peanut.
Unlike many other cultural groups in what is now Peru, the Aguaruna were never successfully conquered by the Inca, although there are accounts of attempts to extend into the territory by Incas Huayna Capac and Tupac Inca Yupanqui.
The Spanish conquistadors first encountered the Aguaruna in 1549 when the towns of Jaén de Bracamoros and Santa Maria de Nieva were founded. Fifty years later, a rebellion among the indigenous people of the region forced the Spaniards out of the area. An agricultural colony was later established at Borja in 1865. Attempts by Dominican and Jesuit missionaries to convert the Aguarunas were largely unsuccessful.
Traditionally, the economy of the Aguaruna is based mostly on hunting, fishing and subsistence agriculture. However, over the last few decades they have increasingly become engaged in various market activities. Some communities now cultivate rice, coffee, cocoa and bananas for sale, either in local markets or for transport to coastal cities like Chiclayo. Maintenance of the transandean oil pipeline and the medicinal plant industry also play roles in the local economy.
Maybe Aymara will be added :
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The Aymara are a native ethnic group in the Andes region of South America; about 2.3 million live in Bolivia, Peru, Northern Chile, and Northern Argentina (in particular in Salta Province). They lived in the region for many centuries before becoming a subject people of the Inca, and later of the Spanish in the 16th century.
History
The Aymara have existed in the Andes in what is now Bolivia (and, to a lesser extent, Peru) for over 2,000 years, according to some estimates. Some scholars, and many Aymara themselves, associate them with the highly advanced civilization centered at Tiwanaku, though due to the lack of written history this cannot be proven conclusively, and does not fit with the linguistic evidence. The region where Tiwanaku and the modern Aymara are located, the Altiplano, was conquered by the Incas under Huayna Capac (reign 1483-1523), although the exact date of this takeover is unknown. It is most likely that the Inca had a strong influence over the Aymara region for some time. The architecture for which the Inca are now known is clearly modeled after the Tiwanaku style. Though conquered by the Inca, the Aymara retained some degree of autonomy under the empire. There were a number of ethnic groups which were later to be known Aymara by the Spanish. These were divided upon different chieftainties. These included the Charqa, Qharaqhara, Quillaca, Asanaqui, Carangas, Sivaroyos, Haracapi, Pacajes, Lupacas, Soras, among others. Upon arrival of the Spanish, all these groups were spread in what today is Bolivia. Looking at the history of the languages, however, rather than their current distribution, it is clear that Aymara was once spoken much further north, at least as far north as central Peru, where most Andean linguists feel it is most likely that Aymara originated (see 'Geography' below). In fact, the Inca nobility may themselves originally have been Aymara-speakers, who switched to Quechua only shortly before the Inca expansion: the Cuzco area has many Aymara placenames, and the so-called 'Secret language of the Incas' actually appears to be a form of Aymara.
Geography
Most present day Aymara-speakers live in the Lake Titicaca region also known as the Altiplano, and are concentrated south of the lake. The capital of the ancient Aymara civilization was the city of Chucuito, located on the shore of Lake Titicaca about 120 miles south-east of the modern city of Puno. The present urban center of the Aymara region is El Alto, a 750,000-person city near the Bolivian capital La Paz. In addition, numerous Aymara live and work as campesinos in the surrounding Altiplano. The Aymara language does have one surviving relative, spoken by a small, isolated group of about 1000 people far to the north in the mountains inland from Lima in Central Peru (in and around the village of Tupe, Yauyos province, Lima department). This language, known as Jaqaru/Kawki, is of the same family as Aymara, indeed some linguists refer to it as 'Central Aymara', alongside the main 'Southern Aymara' branch of the family spoken in the Titicaca region.
Culture
The native language of the Aymara is also named Aymara; in addition, many Aymara speak Spanish, which is the dominant language of the countries in which they live, as a second language. The Aymara flag is known as the Wiphala; it consists of seven colors quilted together with diagonal stripes. Aymara have grown and chewed coca plants for centuries, and used its leaves in traditional medicine as well as in ritual offerings to the sun god Inti and the earth goddess Pachamama. Over the last century, this has brought them into conflict with state authorities who have carried out coca eradication plans in order to prevent the creation of the drug cocaine, which is created by extracting the chemical from coca leaves in a complex chemical process. Coca plays a profound role in the indigenous religions of both the Aymara and the Quechua, and in more recent times has become a symbol of cultural identity.
Possible Incan unit tree!
Range Units
Huaraca - Slingers
Tangul - Bowmen
Waraqa - Slingers
Hacha Ch'anyita - Throwing Axemen
Chuki Ch'anyita - Javelins
Boleadora - 3-Weight Bolas
Avestrucera - 2-Weight Bolas
Infantry
Chasquis - Messengers (had some millitary training)
Yachakuq Runa - Novices (had some millitary training)
Champi Chuki - Bronze Spears
Anta Chuki - Copper Spears
Qurichisqa Chuki - Noble Golden Spears
Hacha - Axemen
Waqtana - Club
Anta Waqtana - Copper Mace
Awqalli - Club
Awqapuriq - Spear
Champis - Short Axe
Unfortunately we still need a modeler or three. If you are intrested please PM me (we can take anyone, not just modelers)
For more information please look here!
Byzantine Knight