Table of Contents
Who could read the quipu?
According to Guaman Poma, quipucamayocs could “read” the quipus with their eyes closed. Quipucamayocs were from a class of people, “males, fifty to sixty”, and were not the only members of Inca society to use quipus.
How does the quipu system work?
The Incas had developed a method of recording numerical information which did not require writing. It involved knots in strings called quipu. The quipu consists of strings which were knotted to represent numbers. A number was represented by knots in the string, using a positional base 10 representation.
Is quipu still used today?
A quipu (khipu) was a method used by the Incas and other ancient Andean cultures to keep records and communicate information using string and knots. Quipu are still used today across South America.
Why is quipu considered mysterious?
The quipu or khipu is both ordinary and mysterious. Made from cotton or wool knotted cords, it was the backbone of the bureaucratic and centralised Inca Empire, used to record amounts of goods and numbers of people. Computations were decimal, the highest knot standing for one, the next for 10, then 100, 1000 and so on.
What is Inca quipu?
Quipus were the main system employed by the Incas to record information. The knotted cords were used to record countable information. The colors, knots and the distances between the knots enabled those who used the quipus to identify the type of object or the characteristics of the population being recorded.
Is the quipu a writing system?
It is a system of recording transactions that dates back from the time of the Incas. The Incas never developed a written language. However, their system of record keeping called Quipu is unique in human history. Inca recorded accounts with knotted string.
What do the knots mean in quipu?
The Incas had a system of accounting that relied on the quipu. Cords of various colours were attached to a main cord with knots. Then each knot on a cord designated a syllable of the word represented at the head of the cord. For example, the name of Pachacamac, god of earth and time, was divided into four syllables.