ALONG THE INCA TRAILS

Abstract

When one looks at the Inca road network, one must admit that there was a consciousness of empire. The empire had to be united and was bound together by some 400 leagues of roads that, evenly, after a certain distance, would take in a tambo. Humboldt describes what he sees, what he used.  He has seen the Roman roads in various parts of Europe and yet he is amazed. He quotes Sarmiento: "How could a people that did not know iron, open, between rocks and at such heights, roads so large and so superb that in two opposite directions, go from Cuzco to Quito and to the coast of Chile?" How long did it take to build them? Regarding those bordering Quito, the Baron believes a little more than three decades; but about the rest, he acknowledges total ignorance: "their age is lost in deep darkness". He questions the Spanish conquest: in spite of admiring them, they deliberately destroyed these routes to reuse the stones in new monuments.