Author: William Harris Isbell
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9780306467721
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 420
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Book Description
Study of the origin and development of civilization is of unequaled importance for understanding the cultural processes that create human societies. Is cultural evolution directional and regular across human societies and history, or is it opportunistic and capricious? Do apparent regularities come from the way inves tigators construct and manage knowledge, or are they the result of real constraints on and variations in the actual processes? Can such questions even be answered? We believe so, but not easily. By comparing evolutionary sequences from different world civilizations scholars can judge degrees of similarity and difference and then attempt explanation. Of course, we must be careful to assess the influence that societies of the ancient world had on one another (the issue of pristine versus non-pristine cultural devel opment: see discussion in Fried 1967; Price 1978). The Central Andes were the locus of the only societies to achieve pristine civilization in the southern hemi sphere and only in the Central Andes did non-literate (non-written language) civ ilization develop. It seems clear that Central Andean civilization was independent on any graph of archaic culture change. Scholars have often expressed appreciation of the research opportunities offered by the Central Andes as a testing ground for the study of cultural evolu tion (see, e. g. , Carneiro 1970; Ford and Willey 1949: 5; Kosok 1965: 1-14; Lanning 1967: 2-5).
Author: Gary Urton
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 0759123632
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 335
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Book Description
The Inca Empire existed for fewer than 100 years, yet ruled more subjects than either the Aztecs or the Maya and occupied a territory stretching nearly 3000 miles. The Incas left no system of writing; what we know of them has been gleaned from the archaeological record and accounts written following the Spanish invasion. In this A-to-Z encyclopedia, Gary Urton and Adriana von Hagen, together with over thirty contributors, provide a broad introduction to the fascinating civilization of the Incas, including their settlements, culture, society, celebrations, and achievements. Following a broad introduction, 128 individual entries explore wide-ranging themes (religion, architecture, farming) and specific topics (ceremonial drinking cup, astronomy), interweaving ethnohistoric and archaeological research with nuanced interpretation. Each entry provides suggestions for further reading. Sidebars profiling chroniclers and researchers of Inca life—ranging from José de Acosta and Cristóbal de Albornoz to Maria Rostworowski and R. Tom Zuidema—add depth and context for the cultural entries. Cross-references, alphabetical and topical lists of entries, and a thorough index help readers navigate the volume. A chronology, selected bibliography, regional map, and almost ninety illustrations round out the volume. In sum, the Encyclopedia of the Incas provides a unique, comprehensive resource for scholars, as well as the general public, to explore the civilization of the Incas—the largest empire of the pre-Columbian New World.
Author: George Allen Collier
Publisher: New York : Academic Press
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 514
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Book Description
Author:
Publisher: Rowman Altamira
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 649
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Book Description
Author: Brian S. Bauer
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292717725
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 204
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Book Description
The Inca empire was the largest state in the Americas at the time of the Spanish invasion in 1532. From its political center in the Cuzco Valley, it controlled much of the area included in the modern nations of Ecuador, Peru, Chile, and Bolivia. But how the Inca state became a major pan-Andean power is less certain. In this innovative work, Brian S. Bauer challenges traditional views of Inca state development and offers a new interpretation supported by archaeological, historical, and ethnographic evidence. Spanish chroniclers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries attributed the rapid rise of Inca power to a decisive military victory over the Chanca, their traditional rivals, by Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui. By contrast, Bauer questions the usefulness of literal interpretations of the Spanish chronicles and provides instead a regional perspective on the question of state development. He suggests that incipient state growth in the Cuzco region was marked by the gradual consolidation and centralization of political authority in Cuzco, rather than resulting from a single military victory. Synthesizing regional surveys with excavation, historic, and ethnographic data, and investigating broad categories of social and economic organization, he shifts the focus away from legendary accounts and analyzes more general processes of political, economic, and social change.
Author: Sonia Alconini
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190908033
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 881
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Book Description
When Spaniards invaded their realm in 1532, the Incas ruled the largest empire of the pre-Columbian Americas. Just over a century earlier, military campaigns began to extend power across a broad swath of the Andean region, bringing local societies into new relationships with colonists and officials who represented the Inca state. With Cuzco as its capital, the Inca empire encompassed a multitude of peoples of diverse geographic origins and cultural traditions dwelling in the outlying provinces and frontier regions. Bringing together an international group of well-established scholars and emerging researchers, this handbook is dedicated to revealing the origins of this empire, as well as its evolution and aftermath. Chapters break new ground using innovative multidisciplinary research from the areas of archaeology, ethnohistory and art history. The scope of this handbook is comprehensive. It places the century of Inca imperial expansion within a broader historical and archaeological context, and then turns from Inca origins to the imperial political economy and institutions that facilitated expansion. Provincial and frontier case studies explore the negotiation and implementation of state policies and institutions, and their effects on the communities and individuals that made up the bulk of the population. Several chapters describe religious power in the Andes, as well as the special statuses that staffed the state religion, maintained records, served royal households, and produced fine craft goods to support state activities. The Incas did not disappear in 1532, and the volume continues into the Colonial and later periods, exploring not only the effects of the Spanish conquest on the lives of the indigenous populations, but also the cultural continuities and discontinuities. Moving into the present, the volume ends will an overview of the ways in which the image of the Inca and the pre-Columbian past is memorialized and reinterpreted by contemporary Andeans.
Author: H. James Birx
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1412957389
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1139
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Book Description
Highlighting the most important topics, issues, questions and debates, these two volumes offer full coverage of major subthemes and subfields within the discipline of anthropology.
Author: Izumi Shimada
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 1477303936
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 393
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Book Description
Massive yet elegantly executed masonry architecture and andenes (agricultural terraces) set against majestic and seemingly boundless Andean landscapes, roads built in defiance of rugged terrains, and fine textiles with orderly geometric designs—all were created within the largest political system in the ancient New World, a system headed, paradoxically, by a single, small minority group without wheeled vehicles, markets, or a writing system, the Inka. For some 130 years (ca. A.D. 1400 to 1533), the Inka ruled over at least eighty-six ethnic groups in an empire that encompassed about 2 million square kilometers, from the northernmost region of the Ecuador–Colombia border to northwest Argentina. The Inka Empire brings together leading international scholars from many complementary disciplines, including human genetics, linguistics, textile and architectural studies, ethnohistory, and archaeology, to present a state-of-the-art, holistic, and in-depth vision of the Inkas. The contributors provide the latest data and understandings of the political, demographic, and linguistic evolution of the Inkas, from the formative era prior to their political ascendancy to their post-conquest transformation. The scholars also offer an updated vision of the unity, diversity, and essence of the material, organizational, and symbolic-ideological features of the Inka Empire. As a whole, The Inka Empire demonstrates the necessity and value of a multidisciplinary approach that incorporates the insights of fields beyond archaeology and ethnohistory. And with essays by scholars from seven countries, it reflects the cosmopolitanism that has characterized Inka studies ever since its beginnings in the nineteenth century.
Author: Gordon F Mcewan
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 9780393333015
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292
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Book Description
The Incas: New Perspectives offers a revealing portrait of the ancient Andean empire from the earliest stages of its development to its final capitulation to Pizzarro in the mid-16th century. In recent years researchers have employed new tools to get to the heart of the mysterious Inca culture. Drawing on recent work in archaeology, anthropology, ethnohistory, and other sources, The Incas provides the most up-to-date interpretations of Inca culture, religion, politics, economics, and daily life available. Readers will discover how the Incas discovered medicines still in use and kept records using knotted cords; how Inca builders created masterful highways and stone bridges; and how the inhabitants of seemingly unfarmable lands came to give the world potatoes, beans, corn, squashes, tomatoes, avocados, peanuts, and peppers. --Publisher.
Author: Daniel Miller
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134806728
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 356
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Book Description
'...uses a wealth of perspectives and case studies from archaeology and its related disciplines to delineate and assess the mechanisms of dominance and of its counterpart, resistance.'^ N - British Archaeology
