by Jim Goodman
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| modern painter's rendition of Inca life |
The Spanish conquest of Peru
was not only a land-and-treasure-grab.
It also involved the deliberate destruction, as far as possible, of an
entire civilization. Not content
with looting the palaces and temples, the conquistadores also destroyed them
and replaced them with churches and mansions in the Spanish style. They were here to stay and they didn’t
want to live in a place so alien and pagan-looking. Here and there they might build on the original Inca
foundation, for example, but in general the new colonial cities had to look
European.
The primary means of
transforming the native way of life was the imposition of Christianity. One can hardly blame the natives for
accepting it. Their own gods
failed to prevent the disaster of the Conquest, so the invaders’ gods were
obviously stronger. And there was
that concept of Heaven, a reward in the after-life for putting up with
exploitation on Earth without rebelling against it.
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| the Lord of Sipan's tomb |
But besides a new religion the
Spanish also introduced new animals, like cattle, pigs and chickens,
contributing to changes eradicating the old ways. This process has continued down to modern times, so that it
is not easy to imagine what life was like before the Spanish came. Other civilized states existed before
the Inca Empire, but these had been abandoned already and what remained in
extant pyramids, palaces and temples suffered the same wanton looting and
destruction as the Inca cities.
Centuries
later, when archaeologists began to excavate, collect and preserve the relics
of the past, there weren’t a whole lot left. Fortunately, a number of gold artifacts remained, enough to
show us the skill of ancient artisans.
Grave robbers, both Spanish and native, made off with most. But one particular site, the tomb of an
ancient Moche king, escaped pilferage.
Discovered in the late 20th century, inland from Chiclayo n
northern Peru, this was an intact tomb of the Lord of Sipan, dating to the
early 3rd century.
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| the Lord of Sipan's procession |
This is generally considered
the South American equivalent of the tomb of Tutankhahmen in Egypt. The Lord of Sipan was buried with several
others, in the primitive belief these would serve him in the afterlife. He was also splendidly dressed for his
internment, but today all that has been removed to a museum in Lambayeque, near
Chiclayo. What remains is a
recreation of the burial site, which is near the sand-encrusted mound that
covers the original palace,
All the original artifacts, jewelry,
vestments and ornaments of the tomb of the Lord of Sipan are now displayed in
the museum in Lambayeqeu. The most
visited museum in the country, for Peruvians, it’s the only one where
photography is not permitted. It’s
easy to see why. In this
narcissistic age, progress through the museum would be much impeded by people
taking selfies of themselves beside the recreated court of the Lord of Sipan,
among other places.
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| Moche gold necklace |
The amount of excavated items
exhibited in this museum, all from a single site, reveal much about the life of
the ancient Peruvian elite. The
Lord of Sipan wore a large, crescent-shaped crown, made from a single sheet of
gold. He also wore other gold
ornaments and carried a gold-topped scepter. Scholars believe that when the Lord appeared in public he
faced the sun so that its rays flashed against his gold crown and ornaments,
dazzling the eyes of his subjects.
High-ranking nobles and
warrior chiefs also wore gold ornaments, on the head or through the nose. The priests also had gold necklaces of
the heads of the gods, which they either wore or dangled from staffs during
ceremonies. Restorers have removed
the corrosion of so many centuries, polished them up and now they look like
when they were first made. All of
these items, along with weapons, ritual paraphernalia, beaded necklaces and so
on, along with the paintings and models of the Lord of Sipan’s times, give the
visitor a fairly complete picture of ancient Moche royalty.
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| Moche warrior |
One of the most obvious traits
of this society was the projection of power. Great public ceremonies achieved this domestically. Normally hidden behind his palace
walls, on this occasion the Lord of Sipan dressed in his most magnificent
raiment, rode in a litter borne through the streets to the ritual site,
surrounded by warriors and priests.
In full view of his subjects, assembled for the event, the Lord
witnessed his priests conduct rites designed to channel more spiritual power to
the state, personified by its Lord, as well as keep the people in awe of their
ruler.
The other way to project power
was by waging war against neighbors.
Warfare seems to have been an important part of just about every pre-Conquest
civilization. At Sechin, an
excavated ruined city that flourished about 1500 BCE, the most outstanding
features are the walls with engraved portraits of ferocious armed warriors and
the severed heads and limbs of their battles. In the interiors of the Moche pyramids near Trujillo, the
Temple of the Sun and Moon, built around two thousand years later, warriors on
one wall duel in pairs and on other walls march off to combat with maces and
javelins.
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| dueling Moche warriors |
Ancient Peruvian armies had
archers with bows to fire arrows at the opposing ranks, but most of the battle
action was hand-to-hand with clubs, maces, battle-axes and slings. Warriors painted their faces and maybe
wore animal skins to look fierce, but not much body armor, if any. Judging from extant sculptures and
depictions of warriors on ceramics, weaponry didn’t develop over the centuries
until the Spanish began fighting the natives with a new kind of warrior—one
mounted on a horse.
To deal with this phenomenon
the Incas invented the bolas, a device consisting of three stones tied to
connected lengths of llama tendons.
They hurled these twirling missiles at the horses’ legs, which entangled
them and brought them down to the ground, toppling their riders as well. Then they would throw a bolas around
the fallen soldier, all but immobilizing him. His rescuers would find the tough llama tendons difficult to
sever, even with their European-made, top-of-the-line swords and daggers,
especially while fighting off the attackers.
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| guano islands |
Pre-colonial Peruvian states
were highly stratified and evolved no sense of the popular will, only the will
of the ruler. In these centrally
organized societies the people owed their rulers service of one kind or
another: producing food, working
as craftsmen, construction workers or serving as soldiers. While some people in the upper classes
were generals or career officers, other than a contingent of palace guards the
states probably had no standing armies.
They simply assembled one from the ranks of the commoners, trained them
and sent them off to war.
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| contemporary flautist |
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| ancient flautist |
Defense of the state, as well
as its expansion, was an inherent duty of the ruling class. But it also had the responsibility of
the welfare of its subjects. The
Incas, for example, kept numerous storehouses stocked with food, clothing,
weapons, blankets, household goods and just about everything produced in the
realm. The state would distribute
these items whenever necessary.
(When the conquistadores organized the systematic looting of Cusco, they
themselves went after the gold and other valuables in the palaces and temples
and left the storehouses to their Indian auxiliaries.)
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| carrying on a litter |
In general, warfare was
periodic, not an annual event. The
basic economy of these states was agriculture, supplemented in the coastal
states by fishing. In the arid
deserts of coastal Peru, this was only possible in the thin strip of land along
the rivers that flowed from the Andes to the sea. States organized labor forces to build irrigation systems
that extended the cultivable lands.
Peru had no draft animals then, so men used foot-plows, which were long
poles with hardened points and handles, to lift up the soil, while the crouched
women beside them broke up the clods and planted the seeds.
The fertilizer for these
fields was guano, the excrement of sea birds like the Guanay cormorant, booty
and pelican. The main source, for
over 1500 years, was guano-encrusted islands just off the coast of central
Peru. With its high uric acid
content, it was rich in nitrogen, potash and phosphoric acid. It was effective in both the coastal
plains and the mountains. The
Incas also organized its extraction and distribution and enforced edicts
against killing or capturing the birds that produced it.
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| pounding grain |
Agriculture in the highlands
differed from that in the coastal plains because not so much relatively level
land was available. So the people
also constructed great, stonewalled terraces that climbed up the steep sides of
the mountains flanking the valleys.
These are among the popular tourist attractions at places like Machu
Picchu, Pisac and Ollantaytambo. Farmers
grew potatoes, maize, quinoa and coca in them. Due to population transfers and the effects of repeated
earthquakes, they are no longer in use, but stand as testimonials to
pre-colonial Peruvian engineering skills.
The land was owned and worked
collectively, so at planting and harvest time the terraces were filled with
villagers. It was not all grueling
work, though, for Spanish chroniclers observed that the natives took many
breaks, drank chicha (maize beer), amused
themselves with music and dance and then carried on with the task. Judging from the ceramic sculptures
preserved in Peru’s museums, flutes and drums were the main musical instruments
employed. But the Peruvian Pan
pipes are also very ancient, as witnessed by the Moche ceramic of a figure
playing the same instrument tourists hear today in fancy restaurants, listening
to their umpteenth rendition of the old Simon and Garfunkel hit “El Condor
Pasa.”
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| Peruvian Pan pipes |
Pre-Conquest ceramics
preserved in Peru’s many museums provide much insight into how people lived
back then. Unlike ceramics from
ancient Europe or China, that have to be painstakingly re-assembled from
shards, those from ancient Peru were made for funerals and interred with the
corpses. Thus, excavators found
them intact. Intended for use in the
afterlife, as vases, cups, bowls, pitchers and so on, they depict all the
aspects of everyday life
There are all the animals of their environment: llamas, pumas, lizards, snakes, fish,
frogs, monkeys and jaguars. Others
portray warriors, diseased people, gods, fishermen and very realistic
commoners. There are vignettes of
everyday chores like pounding grain, toting water jugs, giving birth, carrying
someone on a litter, catching fish, confronting a wild animal and making
love.
Many of these vignettes in
ceramic are still part of rural life in Peru, especially the poorer, less
developed areas. The ancient
textiles in museum exhibits were woven on simple backs-trap looms, still in use
today in the highlands. Andean
women don’t weave all the cloth for their clothing, for it is so much easier to
buy it in the market, but use narrower looms for belts and scarves.
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| weaving with an ancient type of loom |
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| field shrine, Taquile Island,LakeTiticaca |
When the conquistadores
finally consolidated their rule in Peru they pursued an aggressive assimilation
policy. The Indians not only had
to convert to Christianity, they had to relocate from their “squalid” villages
to new towns. Spanish bishops
alleged that the dark, circular, thatched huts with no interior walls were
conducive to incest. The relocated
Indians were to live in square buildings with separate rooms and tiled
roofs. Round stone buildings with
thatched roofs still exist in Andean villages, but these are used for storage
rather than residence.
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| bulls on the roof to bring prosperity and fertility |
As for religion, over four and
a half centuries of Christianity has not wiped out every indigenous
belief. It’s hard to totally
eradicate a farmer’s ingrained, ancient inclination to honor the spirit of the
land he tills. So here and there
one finds modest field shrines, though these are not used for rituals or
sacrifices anymore.
Other customs survived the
Conquest through adaptation. The
roofs of Andean village houses feature ceramic statures of a pair of bulls on
top. They represent prosperity and
fertility and may be backed by a Christian cross. Perhaps the priests tolerated this ‘superstitious’ symbolism
because the people added the cross and began using animals that the Spanish
introduced. Originally they were a
pair of llamas, backed by symbols of the sun and moon.
The Conquest devastated the
native people of Peru. Disease,
war and gross exploitation sent the population figures into a precipitous
decline. But over time they
recovered and today the native Indians and those of mixed Indian-European blood
make up a majority of the population, the only country in South America where
that holds true. Contemporary
Peruvians are quite ware of this and embrace the multiple heritages that make up
their country’s identity. It’s
Moche, it’s Inca, it’s Spanish, it’s ancient, it’s colonial, it’s
whatever is in the country, past or present. It makes no
difference. It’s all Peru.
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| ancient terraces at Pisac,used until last century |
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