This article is part of our Summer reads series. Visit the full collection for book lists, guest essays and more seasonal distractions. SPAIN’S CONQUEST of the Inca empire in the 16th century was ...

The 14,000-foot-high plain of the Andes, where the Inca civilization flourished five centuries ago, is as barren a land as the world possesses. With its packs of llamas running across the puna, ...

"Land of the Four Quarters" or Tahuantinsuyu is the name the Inca gave to their empire. It stretched north to south some 2,500 miles along the high mountainous Andean range from Colombia to Chile and ...

The seeds of the Inca Empire were planted about 2,700 years ago when a warm spell combined with piles of llama excrement allowed maize agriculture to take root high up in the South American Andes, ...

The Inca city in Peru is one of the most recognizable historical sites in the world. Built in the mid-15th century, it served as a royal estate for the rulers of the Inca Empire before the arrival of ...

The heaps of khipus emerged from garbage bags in the back of the tiny, one-room museum—clumps of tangled ropes the size of beach balls. Sabine Hyland smiled as she gazed down at them and said, “Qué ...

The Inca Empire in South America, one of the most powerful pre-Columbian societies, was known for many innovations — such as the architecture of Machu Picchu, an extensive road network, and a system ...

Long before Spanish colonization, the indigenous people of Peru kept track of important dates and numbers, and perhaps even stories, using a mysterious coding system of strings and knots called a ...