From Middle Horizon cord-keeping to the rise of Inka khipus in the central Andes

Abstract

Recording devices formed of knotted cords, known as khipus , are a well-known feature of imperial administration among the Inka of Andean South America. The origins and antecedents of this recording system are, however, much less clearly documented. Important insights into that ancestry are offered by a group of eight khipus dating from the later part of the Middle Horizon period (AD 600–1000), probably used by the pre-Inka Wari culture of the central Andes. This article reports the AMS dating of four of these early khipus. A feature of the Middle Horizon khipus is the clustering of knots in groups of five, suggesting that they were produced by a people with a base five number system. Later, Inka khipus were organised instead around a decimal place-value system. Hence the Inka appear to have encountered the base five khipus among Wari descendant communities late in the Middle Horizon or early in the Late Intermediate period (AD 1000–1450), subsequently adapting them to a decimal system.