Territorial Expansion and Administrative Consolidation in the Inka Heartland, Cusco, Peru: The Xaquixaguana Plain Archaeological Survey

American Museum Natural History, New York NY

Investigators

Abstract

With support from the National Science Foundation, Dr. R. Alan Covey and a team of American and Peruvian colleagues will conduct two field seasons of archaeological and ethnohistoric research on the Xaquixaguana Plain, located to the west of the city of Cuzco in the Andean highlands. This interdisciplinary research comprises an intensive regional survey and the study of unpublished sixteenth-century documents housed in Peruvian archives. Researchers will use settlement pattern data and geographic information from archival documents to delimit territorial divisions, evaluate the complexity of local settlement hierarchies, and identify Inka imperial infrastructure in the study region. The new data will advance our understanding of how the Inka polity conquered the many polities and ethnic groups living around the Cuzco Valley, as well as the means by which the Cuzco region was transformed into a highly integrated imperial heartland. The new field research on the Xaquixaguana Plain will build on existing archaeological and ethnohistoric data to test a suite of hypotheses regarding Inka expansion strategies during early campaigns of territorial expansion (c. A.D. 1200-1400), and the nature of political and economic consolidation during the imperial period (c. 1400-1532). Previous research suggests that early Inka expansion targeted groups of moderate political complexity, especially those living along important routes between different ecological zones. Following the conquest of local groups, the Inka empire appears to have used two strategies to consolidate control in their heartland: the development of imperial infrastructure (roads, waystations, and production enclaves), as well as the construction of new agricultural and herding resources directly controlled by royal Inka lineages. By studying settlement pattern change in a region known to have pre-Inka groups of varying complexity, as well as imperial infrastructure and royal estates, this project will yield new insights on Inka expansion and imperial administration. The intellectual merit of this research rests on its contribution to the study of how Inka imperial strategies developed. The field survey will add to three previous projects, providing settlement pattern data for most of the area within about 25-30 km of the Inka capital. The new data will enable researchers to evaluate the accuracy of historical accounts of ethnic diversity and political complexity in the study region, as well as to determine the degree to which local economies were reorganized as the Inka resettled provincial retainer populations in the region to serve the royal lineages. An interdisciplinary interpretation of early Inka expansion and administrative strategies will advance our understanding of how the Inka built the largest (and most ecologically and ethnically diverse) empire in the prehispanic Americas. The broader impact of this research is the training of American and Peruvian students. Graduate students will learn archaeological survey methods, and will be encouraged to use the new regional data as a point of departure for designing independent projects for professional degrees and doctoral dissertations. Project data and archival documents will also be used to train undergraduate and graduate students through the many educational outreach programs maintained by the American Museum of Natural History.