Chuck Guy, age 12, of Nashville, tem., for his question:
Where did the Incas come From?
The Spanish explorers of the new World were dazzled by the golden objects displayed by the Incas. They were also dazzled by the tales that the Incas had to tell about themselves. For a long time many people thought that the empire of the Incas surpassed the civilizations of the Old World. These ideas changed when cool headed scientists had time to explore the facts.
The empire of the Incas stretched 3000 miles along the Pacific shorts and extended inland over the ridges of the lofty Andes. Archeologists art trying to sort the facts from fiction concerning this vast organization of territory, for the Incas told fanciful tales about themse1ves and their origins. These legends do not agree with the facts revealed by scientific investigation. It is true that the Inca people built and ran a vast and well organized empire. But they were not satisfied, it seems, with their tremendous achievements. They pretended to be more than they actually were. They invented glamorous tales of their origins to impress their subjects. To do this, they had to destroy the true history of South American culture which existed before the Inca people owe to power. We are impressed with the true descendents of the Inca people. But we do not thank them for trying to wipe out the records of the cultures that flourished before them. Time after time, it seems, civilizations developed in and around the Andes mountains and, because of the Incas, archeologists have had to dig hard to bring them to light.
The Inca, people say that they originated near Lake Titicaca, which is high in the mountains of southern Peru. From there they went north to establish their first city of Cusco. These items may well be true, for we know from the ruins of Cusco (or Cuzco) that this city was certainly the center of the Inca empire. From here, these energetic people spread out to conquer and organize their vast empire, and the job was done within 100 or 200 years. The Inca people were a tribe of Indians called the Quechua or Keshwa, and Quechua was the official language of the Inca empire.
A thousand years ago, countless small tribes were scattered among the slopes and valleys of the Andes. The Quechua., meaning the warm valley people, lived on a high, grassy tableland watered by the river Apurimac. Here they built their fortified city, Cusco, and went forth to conquer the scattered tribes and organize them in a vast empire. The ruler of the empire was the Inca who claimed to be a god related to the sun.