1. Characteristics

2. Masonry and construction methods

3. Symbolism and Patronage
     Aesthetics: Combining the Built and Natural Environments    Politics: Expansionist and Subservient Ideologies  

4. See also

5. Notes

6. References

7. External links

Characteristics

Inca buildings were made out of fieldstones or semi-worked stone blocks and dirt set in mortar; adobe walls were also quite common, usually laid over stone foundations.^[3] The material used in the Inca buildings depended on the region, for instance, in the coast they used large rectangular adobe blocks while in the Andes they used local stones.^[4]

The most common shape in Inca architecture was the rectangular building without any internal walls and roofed with wooden beams and thatch.^[5] There were several variations of this basic design, including gabled roofs, rooms with one or two of the long sides opened and rooms that shared a long wall.^[6] Rectangular buildings were used for quite different functions in almost all Inca buildings, from humble houses to palaces and temples.^[7] Even so, there are some examples of curved walls on Inca buildings, mostly in regions outside the central area of the empire.^[8] Two-story buildings were infrequent; when they were built the second floor was accessed from the outside via a stairway or high terrain rather than from the first floor.^[9] Wall apertures, including doors, niches and windows, usually had a trapezoidal shape; they could be fitted with double or triple jambs as a form of ornamentation.^[10] Other kinds of decoration were scarce; some walls were painted or adorned with metal plaques, in rare cases walls were sculpted with small animals or geometric patterns.^[11]

The most common composite form in Inca architecture was the kancha, a rectangular enclosure housing three or more rectangular buildings placed symmetrically around a central courtyard.^[12] Kancha units served widely different purposes as they formed the basis of simple dwellings as well as of temples and palaces; furthermore, several kancha could be grouped together to form blocks in Inca settlements.^[13] A testimony of the importance of these compounds in Inca architecture is that the central part of the Inca capital of Cusco consisted of large kancha, including Qurikancha and the Inca palaces.^[14] The best preserved examples of kancha are found at Ollantaytambo, an Inca settlement located along the Urubamba River.^[15]

Inca architecture is widely known for its fine masonry, which features precisely cut and shaped stones closely fitted without mortar ("dry").^[16] However, despite this fame, most Inca buildings were actually made out of fieldstone and adobe as described above.^[17] In the 1940s, American archaeologist John H. Rowe classified Inca fine masonry in two types: coursed, which features rectangular shaped stones, and polygonal, which features blocks of irregular shape.^[18] Forty years later, Peruvian architect Santiago Agurto established four subtypes by dividing the categories identified by Rowe:^[19]

• Cellular polygonal masonry: with small blocks
• Ashlar polygonal masonry: with very large stones
• Encased coursed masonry: in which stone blocks are not aligned
• Sedimentary coursed masonry: in which stones are laid out in horizontal rows (i.e., ashlars)

The first two types were used on important buildings or perimeter walls while the last two were employed mostly on terrace walls and river canalization.^[20]

According to Graziano Gasparini and Luise Margolies, Inca stonemasonry was inspired by the architecture of Tiwanaku, an archaeological site in modern Bolivia built several centuries before the Inca Empire.^[21] They argue that according to ethnohistorical accounts the Incas were impressed by these monuments and employed large numbers of stoneworkers from nearby regions in the construction of their own buildings.^[22] In addition to these references, they also identified some formal similarities between Tiwanaku and Inca architecture including the use of cut and polished stone blocks, as well as of double jambs.^[23] A problem with this hypothesis is the question of how was expertise preserved in the three hundred years between the collapse of Tiwanaku and the appearance of the Inca Empire and its architecture. As a solution, John Hyslop has argued that the Tiahuanaco stonemasonry tradition was preserved in the Lake Titicaca region in sites such as Tanka Tanka, which features walls resembling Inca polygonal masonry.^[24]

A second major influence on Inca architecture came from the Wari culture, a civilization contemporary to Tiwanaku. According to Ann Kendall, the Huari introduced their tradition of building rectangular enclosures in the Cusco region, which formed a model for the development of the Inca kancha.^[25] There is evidence that such traditions were preserved in the Cusco region after the decline of the Wari as is attested by the enclosures found at sites such as Choquequirao (Chuqi K'iraw), 28 kilometers southeast of the Inca capital.^[26]

Masonry and construction methods

Water engineer Ken Wright estimates that 60 percent of the Inca construction effort was underground. The Inca built their cities with locally available materials, usually including limestone or granite. To cut these hard rocks the Inca used stone, bronze or copper tools, usually splitting the stones along the natural fracture lines. Without the wheel the stones were rolled up with wood beams on earth ramps. Extraordinary manpower would have been necessary. Hyslop comments that the 'secret' to the production of fine Inca masonry “…was the social organization necessary to maintain the great numbers of people creating such energy-consuming monuments.” It is speculated that the stones were swung into place using friction to create perfectly convex and concave sides. Visible marks of facture like stone bosses were made using rope; these elements demonstrated the artistic value of labor and the power of Inca rule.^[27]

Usually the walls of Incan buildings were slightly inclined inside and the corners were rounded. This, in combination with masonry thoroughness, led Incan buildings to have a peerless seismic resistance thanks to high static and dynamic steadiness, absence of resonant frequencies and stress concentration points. During an earthquake with a small or moderate magnitude, masonry was stable, and during a strong earthquake stone blocks were “ dancing ” near their normal positions and lay down exactly in right order after an earthquake.

Another building method was called "pillow-faced" architecture. The Incas would sand large, finely shaped stones which they would fit together in jigsaw like patterns. Pillow-faced architecture was typically used for temples and royal places like Machu Picchu.

Symbolism and Patronage

Aesthetics: Combining the Built and Natural Environments

Inca architecture is strongly characterized by its use of the natural environment.^[29] The Inca managed to seamlessly merge their architecture into the surrounding land and its specificities.^[30] At its peak, the Inca Empire spanned from Ecuador to Chile and Argentina. Yet despite geographic variances, Inca architecture remained consistent in its ability to visually blend the built and natural environment.^[30]

In particular, Inca walls practiced mortarless masonry and used partially worked, irregularly shaped rocks to complement the organic qualities and diversity of the natural environment.^[31] Through the dry fitted masonry techniques of caninacukpirca, the Incas shaped their stone to conceal natural outcrops, fit tight crevices, and ultimately incorporate the landscape into their infrastructure.^[29]

The Inca also used natural bedrock as their structural foundations (to help keep the buildings stable).^[2] This pragmatically stabilized their structures built in the Andes mountain range of South America, while aesthetically disguising the boundaries between mountain and edifice.^[2] In combination, the diversity of stone shape, materiality, and facture all furthered the naturalistic illusion of the Inca's built environment.^[32]

Politics: Expansionist and Subservient Ideologies

Inca employment and integration of the natural environment into their architecture played an essential role in their program of civilizational expansion and cultural imperialism.^[2] Patronage of powerful elites and rulers of the Inca empire was a major impetus behind the construction of Inca structures, and much of the remaining architecture we see today was most likely royal estates or mobile capitals for Sapa Inca to inhabit.^[30] The Sapa Inca naturalized and asserted their political rule through their palaces' aesthetic appeal to a reciprocal relationship between their imperialism and the earth itself.^[29] The blended, architectural aesthetic colored their political expansion in a sense of inseparable, timeless, and spiritual authority.^[30] For example, in the royal estate of Chinchero, the Incas adapted their large-scale earthwork and massive stone construction to the land's dramatically steep valley in order to create intense, visual drama.^[30] Similarly to the architecture of other mountainous Inca citadels, such as Machu Picchu, the Chinchero estate's dynamic construction into the severe landscape demonstrated the raw, physical power of the Incas, and projected an authoritative aura for those who approached.^[30]

The actual process of constructing the royal palaces served as an additional royal tactic of maintaining rule.^[2] Inca architecture demonstrates a commitment to the culturally pervasive, yet more physically difficult, process of mortarless, polygonal masonry and conscious accommodation of a land's natural topography.^[29] The upholding of these non-utilitarian practices of construction can give insight into Inca values concerning the artistic integrity and cultural meaning embedded within the process of building estates,^[32] and how the building of royal palaces can be understood as a physical enactment of political loyalty and communal subservience to the Sapa Inca.^[30]

See also

• Suspension bridge
• Inca rope bridge

Notes

References

• {{es icon}} Vergara, Teresa. “Arte y Cultura del Tahuantinsuyo”. Historia del Peru. Editorial Lexus, 2000. {{ISBN|9972-625-35-4}}
• {{es icon}} Agurto, Santiago. Estudios acerca de la construcción, arquitectura y planeamiento incas. Lima: Cámara Peruana de la Construcción, 1987.
• Gasparini, Graziano and Margolies, Luize. Inca architecture. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1980. {{ISBN|0-253-30443-1}}
• Hyslop, John. Inca settlement planning. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1990. {{ISBN|0-292-73852-8}}
• Kendall, Ann. Aspects of inca architecture: description, function and chronology. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, 1985.
• Protzen, Jean-Pierre. Inca architecture and construction at Ollantaytambo. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.
• Nair, Stella. At home with the Sapa Inca: Architecture, Space, and Legacy at Chinchero. University of Texas Print {{ISBN|1477302506}}
• Rowe, John. An introduction to the archaeology of Cuzco. Cambridge: Harvard University, 1944.
• Dean, Carolyn. "The Inka Married the Earth: Integrated Outcrops and the Making of Place". Art Bulletin. LXXXIX: 502–517, 2007.

External links

• Peru Cultural Society – Inca Architecture
• [https://muse.jhu.edu/article/228207 Witnessing the In-visibility of Inca Architecture – University of Minnesota Press]

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