![]() Hundreds of collcas (storehouses) pepper major centers on the Inca road to the hostile northern frontier such collcas stored food, and, according to Cieza, also furnished the army with clothes, shoes, tents, and arms. Large forces could be stationed long-term at major provincial centers, consistently located on travel corridors and in open plains where an army could camp. Moving and feeding such armies was a critical challenge for the empire, answered by the remarkable armature of the Inca road network and its support settlements. Large armies move slowly, and the spacing of tambos (way stations) every 15–25 kilometers (9–15 miles) suggests relatively short stages compared with other ancient armies. There were porters and thousands of pack llamas with their drovers, carrying food and coca leaf soldiers’ wives guides shell-trumpeters ancestor effigies and the bearers of the royal standard. The Inca ruler traveled on a litter with an escort of armed guards, wives, and servants. The army was commanded by the ruling Inca or a close male relative. Orejones, Inca nobles who wore earspools, formed a distinctly higher level of command they also composed the vanguard and were given particularly crucial tasks. Foot soldiers marched in decimal squadrons, bearing their regional headdress and arms, following their Native officers. Such numbers speak to the unprecedented scale and efficiency of Inca administration.Īn Inca army on the march was a splendid sight. Manco Inca mustered at least 100,000 troops with 80,000 auxiliaries at the siege of Cuzco. In 1533, 35,000 troops were stationed in the provincial center of Hatun Jauja, according to accounts of quipucamayocs. Atahualpa reportedly had 40,000–80,000 soldiers at Cajamarca. By the contact period, Inca armies numbered in the tens to hundreds of thousands. At the emperor’s call to arms from the ushnu in Cuzco’s main plaza-chronicler Pedro de Cieza de León called it the “stone of war”-the word passed down through the provincial governors and Native lords to call up men through the decimal hierarchy. SONS DE CANARI PROFESSIONALAlthough the Incas came to prefer certain ethnic groups for garrisons or for the emperor’s guard, such as the Cañari and Chachapoya, they never developed a professional army, relying instead on forces that could be quickly mustered and disbanded. Inca conscripts were male subjects aged 25–50 performing their labor service, who had little specialized military training. Skeletal remains in the Cuzco area have more lethal cranial injuries in Inca times than before, demonstrating elevated hand-to-hand combat as the empire emerged. Finally the soldiers fought hand-to-hand with maces and small hatchets tied to the wrist, “and with these they did great damage and chopped heads as with a sword” (Cobo 1990 ). Perhaps as important were the components of ritually effective defense: shining discs of precious metal strung at the chest and back, painted standards for each squadron, musical instruments, and effigies of royal ancestors carried into battle “because,” noted the chronicler Bernabé Cobo, “they thought that this was a great help to them in their victories and it made the enemies fearful” (Cobo 1990 ).Īs an Inca army approached, we are told, first the slingers fired, then the archers, and then the lancers. They carried small shields of hard palm wood, decorated with bright cloth and feathers. Soldiers had helmets of thick wool, cane, or wood, and sometimes wore padded cotton armor at the back, they might bear a protective shield of leather or palm-wood slats. Hand-to-hand weapons included clubs of hard palm wood, maces with stone or bronze heads shaped like rings or stars (champi), small hafted axes of metal or stone, thrusting spears with fire-hardened points or metal tips, and macanas, hardwood broadswords said to cut like steel. Coastal conscripts used spear-throwers and spears with fire-hardened points, metal tips, or fish spines bows and arrows were used in many regions, especially the forested eastern lowlands. In the highlands, the primary projectile weapon was the sling, with smooth round or egg-shaped slingstones, followed by the bola (ayllu), two or three stones linked by a cord, thrown against the legs of enemy fighters or Spanish horses. Conscripts fought with the same weapons their ancestors had used. Scale and logistics were the great military strengths of the Incas-not technology, tactics, or battlefield organization. To their accounts can be added archaeological studies of forts, skeletal remains, and destruction episodes. Conquistadors, chroniclers, and Native authors were keenly interested in the topic. Militarism was also prominently celebrated in Inca culture. The Incas were engaged in wars almost continuously, from the initial conquests to the suppression of rebellions, as well as conflict on the frontier and the civil war in the empire’s final years. ![]()
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