Spring 2020 | Harvard University
This course will guide you through an intensive investigation of one of the most remarkable artifacts of the ancient Americas: the quipu (khipu). Quipus were the devices used for record keeping in the Inca empire of pre-Columbian South America. Quipus recorded numerical information useful to Inca administrators, as well as information used to construct accounts of Inca myths, genealogies, histories and other narrative genres. We will study quipu samples in the Peabody Museum, and we will practice the arts of spinning, plying and knotting threads used in the production of quipus. The general objective of the course is to understand how these complex knotted-string devices served the Incas in the recording of information of interest to administrators of what was the largest state of the ancient New World - the Inca Empire.
General
Readings
Introduction
Jan. 29: The Inka Empire, its administration, and its khipu recordkeeping system
a) Gary Urton, “A Brief Introduction to Tawantinsuyu,” in Inka History in Knots (University of Texas Press, 2017), pp. 33–52.
b) Gary Urton, “An Overview of Spanish Colonial Commentary on Andean Knotted-String Records,” in Narrative Threads: Accounting and Recounting in Andean Khipu, eds. Jeffrey Quilter and Gary Urton (University of Texas Press, 2002), pp. 3–25.
Feb. 5: What is ‘Recordkeeping’ and Why Is It Not Necessarily ‘Writing’?
a) John DeFrancis, “What is Writing?” in Visible Speech: The Diverse Oneness of Writing Systems (University of Hawai‘i Press, 1989), pp. 20–64. (WS)
b) Marcia Ascher, “Reading Khipu: Labels, Structure, and Format,” in Narrative Threads, pp. 87–102.
c) Robert Ascher, “Inka Writing,” in Narrative Threads, pp. 103–118.
In-class khipu making!
Feb. 12: Cloth as a Communication Medium in the Andes
a) John V. Murra, “Cloth and Its Function in the Inka State,” in Cloth and Human Experience, eds. Annette B. Weiner and Jane Schneider (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989), pp. 275–302.
b) Ellen Harlizius-Klück, “The Importance of Beginnings: Gender and Reproduction in Mathematics and Weaving,” in Greek and Roman Textiles and Dress, eds. Mary Harlow and Marie-Louise Nosch (Oxbow Books, 2014), pp. 46–59. (WS)
c) William Conklin, “A Khipu Information String Theory,” in Narrative Threads: Accounting and Recounting in Andean Khipu, pp. 53–86.
Viewing Andean/Inka textiles in the Peabody Museum collection
Feb. 19: Structure, Memory and Information
a) Rosaleen Howard, “Landscape, Memory, and Discourse Structure in Quechua Narratives,” in Narrative Threads: Accounting and Recounting in Andean Khipu, pp. 26–47.
b) John Schechter, “The Inca Cantar Histórico: A Lexico-Historical Elaboration on Two Cultural Themes,” Ethnomusicology 23, no. 2 (1979): 191–204. (WS)
c) Bruce Mannheim, “Time, Not the Syllables, Must be Counted: Quechua Parallelism, Word Meaning, and Cultural Analysis,” Michigan Discussions in Anthropology 13 (1998): 245–287. (WS)
d) Gary Urton, “A New Twist in an Old Yarn: Variation in Knot Directionality in the Inka Khipus,” Baessler-Archiv, Neue Folge, 42 (1994): 271–302. (WS)
Feb. 26: Precursors of Inka Khipu
a) Jeffrey Splitstoser, “Practice and Meaning in Spiral-Wrapped Batons and Cords from Cerrillos, a Late Paracas Site in the Inca Valley, Peru,” in Textiles, Technical Practice, and Power in the Andes, eds. Dana Lee Arnold and Penelope Dransart (Archetype Publications, 2014), pp. 46–82. (WS)
b) William J. Conklin, “The Information System of Middle Horizon Quipus,” in Ethnoastronomy and Archaeoastronomy in the American Tropics, eds. Anthony Aveni and Gary Urton (New York Academy of Sciences, 1982), pp. 261–281. (WS)
c) Gary Urton, “From Middle Horizon Cord-Keeping to the Rise of Inka Khipus in the Central Andes,” Antiquity 88 (2014): 205–221. (WS)
Mar. 4: A Theory of Khipu Signs – Binary Coding
a) Gary Urton, Signs of the Inka Khipu (University of Texas Press, 2003), pp. 1–164.
b) Sabine Hyland, “Ply, Markedness, and Redundancy: New Evidence for How Andean Khipus Encoded Information,” American Anthropologist 116, no. 3 (2014): 1–6. (WS)
Mar. 11: Khipus in Inka Administration – I
a) Gary Urton, Inka History in Knots, (University of Texas Press):
Chapter 3, “The Account of the Quipucamayo” (pp. 53–62)
Chapter 4, “Khipus and the Concept of Inventory” (pp. 63–84)
Chapter 5, “Accounting for the State” (pp. 85–100)
Mar. 18 – Spring Recess
Opening of major khipu exhibit; Museum of Art, Lima (MALI), March 19th
Mar. 25: Khipus in Inka Administration – II
a) Gary Urton, Inka History in Knots, (University of Texas Press):
Chapter 8, “Khipus and the Concept of Census” (pp. 143–153)
Chapter 9, “Khipus and the Concept of Tribute” (pp. 154–178)
b) Jon Clindaniel, “Deciphering the Logic of Inka Khipu Cord Color Signs” and “Investigating the Role of Color Banding and Seriation in Inka Khipu Semiosis,” in Toward a Grammar of the Inka Khipu: Investigating the Production of Non-Numerical Signs (unpublished dissertation), pp. 64–115.
Apr. 1: Khipus in Colonial Administration
a) Gary Urton, Inka History in Knots, (University of Texas Press):
Chapter 11, “Khipus as Legal Records” (pp. 207–216)
Chapter 12, “Toward an Historical Anthropology of Khipus” (pp. 217–246)
b) Manuel Medrano and Gary Urton, “Toward the Decipherment of a Set of Mid-Colonial Khipus from the Santa Valley, Coastal Peru,” Ethnohistory 65, no. 1 (2018): 1–20. (WS)
Apr. 8: Khipu Writing / Khipu Narratives
a) Gary Urton, “From Knots to Narratives: Reconstructing the Art of Historical Record Keeping in the Andes from Spanish Transcriptions of Inka Khipus” Ethnohistory 45, no. 3 (1998): 409–438. (WS)
b) Gary Urton, “Recording Signs in Narrative-Accounting Khipu,” in Narrative Threads, pp. 171–196.
c) Sabine Hyland, “Writing with Twisted Cords,” Current Anthropology 58, no. 3 (2017): 1–8. (WS)
d) Jon Clindaniel, “Outlining a Grammar of Inka Khipu Signs,” in Toward a Grammar of the Inka Khipu, pp. 116–134.
Apr. 15: Khipus and Confession in the Colonial Andes
a) Regina Harrison, “Pérez Bocanegra’s Ritual Formulario: Khipu Knots and Confession,” in Narrative Threads, pp. 266–292.
b) Jason Charles, “Unreliable Confessions: Khipus in the Colonial Parish,” The Americas 64, no. 1 (2007): 11–33.
c) Gary Urton, “Sin, Confession and the Arts of Book- and Cord-Keeping: An Intercontinental and Transcultural Exploration of Accounting and Governmentality,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 51, no. 4 (2009): 801–831.
Apr. 22: Ethnographic / Patrimonial Khipu
a) Sabine Hyland, “Knot Direction in a Khipu/Alphabetic Text from the Central Andes,” Latin American Antiquity 25, no. 2 (2014): 1–9.
b) Frank Salomon, “Patrimonial Khipu in a Modern Peruvian Village: An Introduction to the ‘Quipocamayos’ of Tupicocha,” in Narrative Threads, pp. 293–319.
c) José Carlos de la Puente Luna, “That Which Belongs to All: Khipus, Community and Indigenous Legal Activism in the Early Colonial Andes,” The Americas 72, no. 1 (2015): 19–54.
Apr. 29 – A Look Beyond the Khipus and the Andes
a) Haun Saussy, “Interplanetary Literature,” Comparative Literature 63, no. 4 (2011): 438–447.