{"id":2862,"date":"2016-01-03T20:48:49","date_gmt":"2016-01-03T19:48:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/?p=2862"},"modified":"2016-01-03T20:48:49","modified_gmt":"2016-01-03T19:48:49","slug":"unravelling-the-quipu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/?p=2862","title":{"rendered":"Unravelling the quipu"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/?attachment_id=2867\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-2867\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-2867\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/quipu-2.jpg\" alt=\"quipu 2\" width=\"394\" height=\"259\" \/><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Of all the ancient civilisations, we know least about Peru because, as an illiterate society, they had no writing. They did, however, leave <em>quipus<\/em>, elaborate knotted cords mentioned by the Spanish chroniclers, which have still not been fully deciphered.\u00a0 These remain one of the most tantalising challenges in archaeology.<\/p>\n<p>.<\/p>\n<p>There are around 600 known <em>quipus<\/em> around the world, either in museums or private collections.\u00a0 Some of these <em>quipus<\/em> follow a straightforward numerical pattern, as if itemising goods.\u00a0 Others are more random and difficult to interpret.\u00a0 And even with the numerical <em>quipu<\/em>, we have no way of knowing what the numbers refer to, as for the vast majority there is no provenance \u2013 the <em>quipus<\/em> have arrived in collections from dealers, from the booty of conquistadors, from looted tombs, or by accident.<\/p>\n<p>Until now.\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/01\/03\/world\/americas\/untangling-an-accounting-tool-and-an-ancient-incan-mystery.html?ref=international&amp;_r=1\" target=\"_blank\">The team led by Harvard\u2019s Gary Urton has been looking at some quipu discovered recently near the goods they may have itemised <\/a>\u2013 a potential breakthrough, if not, as he is careful to say, a Rosetta Stone. \u00a0The quipus &#8211; or khipus \u00a0&#8211; were buried under the remnants of centuries-old produce, which was preserved thanks to the extremely dry desert conditions.<\/p>\n<p>We long for the pre-Columbian civilisations to be able to speak to us direct from beyond the grave:\u00a0 is there some Homeric tale, some Peruvian <em>Gilgamesh<\/em>, of which we know nothing? Yet there is a danger that our overwhelming desire for the <em>quipu<\/em> to be proved a form of language could force us into unnatural contortions to prove that what may still just be an accounting device is actually much more.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/?page_id=157\" target=\"_blank\">see<em> Cochineal Red<\/em> for a more detailed discussion of quipus and other aspects of\u00a0pre-Columbian civilisation\u00a0(published as <em>A Sacred Landscape<\/em> in USA)<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref1\" name=\"_ftn1\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>. Of all the ancient civilisations, we know least about Peru because, as an illiterate society, they had no writing. They did, however, leave quipus, elaborate knotted cords mentioned by the Spanish chroniclers, which have still not been fully deciphered.\u00a0 These remain one of the most tantalising challenges in archaeology. . There are around 600 [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2862","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2862"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2862\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2872,"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2862\/revisions\/2872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thewhiterock.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}