Incas

The Inca Empire, which existed from the early 13th to the early 16th centuries, was the largest empire in the Americas before the arrival of the Europeans.

The empire of the Incas stretched as far south as modern Central Chile and as far north as modern Ecuador.

Its capital was Cusco, in what is now southeastern Peru.

Most of the Incas were farmers, and grew root crops, mostly potatoes.

The Incas had llamas and alpacas, which they used to obtain wool.

Although they had no hard metal tools and never invented the wheel, the Incas were skilled engineers.

They built an elaborate network of roads. Some of these roads crossed rivers on floating bridges or rope bridges. Some roads tunneled through hills.

The Incas had used knotted strings, called quipu, for accounting and keeping mathematical records.

They had a well-developed messenger service.

Someone from the court would shout a message to a messenger who was waiting at a staging post. The messenger would then run to the next staging post, where he would pass on the message to the messenger who was stationed there. The message would be passed on that way until it finally reached its destination.

With this system, news was broadcast at speeds of up to 125 miles a day.