The Incas

The 2nd edition of Terence D'Altroy's The Incas is a nice overview of scholarship on the Incas written ten years ago. Drawing on various disciplines and new (at the time) research by archaeologists, linguists, art historians, historians, and ethnographers, D'Altroy's study provides a nearly complete overview of this major Andean civilization. Indeed, the author even endeavored to include more Andean modes of thinking and perspectives in the work, too. For those of us who are still novices toiling in the beginning stages of Inca historical research, this is all fascinating and useful for the bibliographical references. It is also interesting to compare it with overviews of the Inca from past scholars. For instance, Malpass's far shorter introduction from the 1990s, emphasizes more of the negative impact of Inca labor tribute obligations imposed on subject peoples than D'Altroy. Intriguingly, the linguistic evidence used by the author recalls Peace Garcia's theory of an Aymara origin of the title, Inca. Moreover, drawing on Bauer's excavations and research in the Cuzco heartland does suggest an earlier period of Inca political expansion that is not reliably elucidated in the Spanish chronicles drawing on late, imperial Inca History. Indeed, even the standard story of Pachacuti's defeat of the Chankas does not appear justified based on archaeological evidence on this people.