UB linguist searches for new meaning of Inca informational device (fwd)

[Phil CashCash]

UB linguist searches for new meaning of Inca informational device
University at Buffalo

By DONNA LONGENECKER
Reporter Assistant Editor
http://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol35/vol35n14/articles/Brokaw.html

Although the ancient Inca are renowned for their highly organized
society and extraordinary skill in working with gold, stone and
pottery, few are familiar with the khipu—an elaborate system of
colored, knotted strings that many researchers believe to be primarily
mnemonic in nature—like a rosary—and was used by the ancient conquerors
to record census, tribute, genealogies and calendrical information.

Because the Inca didn't employ a recognizable system of writing,
researchers like Galen Brokaw, assistant professor in the Department of
Romance Languages and Literatures in the College of Arts and Sciences,
have focused on the khipu as a way of further illuminating Inca history
and culture. Brokaw doesn't adhere to the strict view held by some
researchers that the khipu is solely mnemonic in nature, instead
maintaining the possibility that these intricate specimens are
historiographic in nature.

Deciphering the mysteries of the khipu, which consists of a primary cord
from which hang pendants of cords, depends upon researchers discovering
a Rosetta Stone of sorts that would allow them to decode the meaning of
the cords and knots. Cord color and the direction of twist and ply of
yarn appear to denote specific meanings, but whether or not the devices
recorded more than statistical or mathematical information, such as
poetry or language, remains elusive to researchers, says Brokaw. He
does believe, however, that some of the specimens—about 600 khipu
survive in museums or private collections—do appear to be
non-numerical.

The khipu didn't originate with the Inca, explains Brokaw, and even
today Andean shepherds can be seen using a form of khipu to record
information about their flocks.

"There's a certain kind of mystery about it that's intriguing," Brokaw
says of the khipu, noting that while there is a tendency among some
researchers to overly romanticize the devices as some kind of writing
system, he believes—after reading the indigenous texts comprised, in
part, of biographies of Inca kings—that it's easy to see how the khipu
might have represented more complex, discursive structures than simply
being records of tribute.

In fact, Brokaw says the first step in understanding the khipu is "to
recognize that it was linked to genres of Andean discourse, powerful
discursive paradigms" that were retained by the indigenous chroniclers
in the organizational structure they employed in writing down the
lineage of the Inca kings. While these chroniclers wrote in the
language of their Spanish conquerors, the discursive paradigms Brokaw
refers to "do not simply dissolve and disappear when translated into
Spanish," he says. One chronicler in particular, he points out,
attributes the principal source of all his information to the khipu.

"One of the questions that colonial chroniclers attempted to answer
about the khipu was whether or not it constituted writing, and much of
the debate today centers around the same issue. Based on a selective
and literal interpretation of colonial sources and a limited
understanding of archaeological specimens, many scholars have argued
that the khipu was not writing, but rather a mnemonic device similar to
a rosary," says Brokaw in his paper "The Poetics of Khipu
Historiography: Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala and the Khipukamayuqs from
Pacariqtambo," published recently in Latin American Research Review.
Guaman Poma, writing around the beginning of the 17th century, is one
of the Andean chroniclers who relied on khipu as his primary source of
information.

The numerical aspect of many of the khipu differs from Western numbering
systems in that Andean societies used and viewed numeration as a way to
define and organize themselves, as well as a way to achieve balance in
all aspects of life—from the aesthetic to emotional and material
concerns, explains Brokaw in "Khipu Numeracy and Alphabetic Literacy in
the Andes," published in Colonial Latin American Review. Brokaw writes
that the "complete decimal unit of 10, for example, is also a metaphor
for the basic social groups called ayllus.

"Furthermore, many colonial chronicles describe a decimal-based system
used in the organization, administration and record keeping of the Inca
empire, and the model of fives is also evident in the historical and
geographical paradigms of Andean sociopolitics," he explains.

Brokaw argues that Guaman Poma's work is shaped not only by European
conventions of text, but also by an Andean conception of historical
discourse. It is that Andean-influenced discourse, or poetics, that is
shaping the Spanish chronicle of Inca kings that Brokaw believes
establishes "an implicit link" between it and the khipu as its physical
representation—indeed, as some type of text in and of itself.

Brokaw's research is funded by a fellowship from the American Council of
Learned Societies. He is working on a book about the subject, titled
"Reading, Writing and Arithmetic: The Andean Khipu and its
Transcriptions."