There is reason to think that such a rupture had occurred at least once before in the history of Andean civilization. The list of more than a hundred Peruvian kings given by the Licentiate Fernando Montesinos (writing about 1650)[126] was formerly viewed with much distrust, chiefly for the reason that the kings of the pre-Inca dynasties recorded by Montesinos are almost without exception unnamed by earlier and prime authorities on Peruvian history (including Garcilasso de la Vega and Cieza de León). Recent discoveries, however, both scholarly and archaeological, have brought a new plausibility to Montesinos's lists, and it appears probable that he derived them from the lost works of Blas Valera, one of the earliest men in the field, known to have had exceptional opportunities for a study of native lore; while at the same time the archaeological investigations of Max Uhle and the brilliant achievements of the expeditions headed by Hiram Bingham have given a new definiteness to knowledge of pre-Inca conditions.[127]
It has long been known that Inca civilization was only the last in a series of Peruvian culture periods. Back of it, in the highlands, lay the Megalithic Age, so called from the great size of the stone blocks in its cyclopean masonry, the earliest centre of this culture being supposed to have been about Lake Titicaca, and especially Tiahuanaco, at the south of the lake—a site remarkable not only for the most extraordinary of all ancient American monuments, the monolithic gate and the surrounding precincts, but also for the importance ascribed to it in legend as a place of origin of nations. Other highland centres, however, hark back to the same period, and Cuzco itself, in old cyclopean walls, shows evidence of an age of Megalithic greatness upon which the later Inca civilization had supervened. Again, in the coastal region from Ica to Truxillo—the realms of the Yunca, according to the older chroniclers—there were several successive culture periods; and though it is possible that traditions such as that of Naymlap (see [Chapter VI, Section V]) indicate a foreign origin for the Yunca peoples, in any case their differing environment would account for much. The peoples of the littoral could have no herds of llamas, since the animal was unable to live in that region; and hence they looked mainly to cotton for their fabrics, while the sea gave them fair compensation in the matter of food. In the lesser arts, especially in that of the potter, they surpassed the highlanders and, indeed, all other Americans; but their building material was adobe, and they have left no magnificent monuments, as have the stone-workers of the hills. Nevertheless at some remote, pre-Inca period the ideas of the coast and those of the highlands met and interchanged: the art of Tiahuanaco is reflected in motive at Truxillo, while the vases of Nasca repeat the bizarre decoration of the monolith of Chavin de Huantar. The hoary sanctity of the great temple of Pachacamac was such that its Inca conqueror adopted the god into his own pantheon; and it was just here, at the Yunca shrine of Pachacamac, that Uhle found evidence of a series of culture periods leading to a considerable antiquity. The indigenous coastal art had already passed its climax of expressive skill when the influence of Tiahuanaco appeared; but this influence lasted long enough to leave an enduring impress on the interregnum-like period which followed, awaiting, as it were, the return of the hills' influence, which came with the advent of the Inca. Such, in brief, is the restoration, and it seems to fit remarkably with Bingham's discoveries and with Montesinos's lists.
Of the one hundred and two kings in these lists, the last ten form the Inca dynasty (a group with respect to which Montesinos is in essential agreement with other chroniclers), whose beginning is placed 1100-1200 a. d.; back of these are the twenty-eight lords of Tampu-Tocco; and still earlier the sixty-four rulers of the ancient empire, forty-six of them forming the amauta (or priest-king) dynasty which followed after the primal line of eighteen Sons of the Gods. Were this scheme of regal succession followed out in extenso the beginnings of the Megalithic Empire of the highlands should fall near the beginning of the first millennium before Christ, and that of the Tampu Tocco dynasty in the early years of our Era. Archaeological and other considerations lead, however, to estimates somewhat more conservative, placing the culmination of the early empire in the first centuries of the Christian era, and the sojourn at Tampu Tocco from about 600-1100 a. d.[128]
The Inca dynasty, established at Cuzco toward 1200 a. d., was the creator of the great empire which the Spaniards found, and its record is the traditional history of Peru, recounted by Garcilasso and Cieza. According to the legend, the Inca tribes had come to Cuzco from a place called Tampu-Tocco, a city of refuge in an inaccessible valley, where for centuries their ancestors had lived in seclusion, the cause of the retirement being as follows: in past generations, it was said, the Amauta dynasty held sway over a great highland realm, extending from Tucuman in the south to Huanuco in the north, the empire having been formed perhaps by the earlier royal house, which was called Pirua, after the name of its first King. In the reign of the forty-sixth Amauta, there came an invasion of hordes from the south and east, preceded by comets, earthquakes, and dire divinations. The King Titu Yupanqui, borne on a golden litter, led his soldiers out to battle; he was slain by an arrow, and his discouraged followers retreated with his body. Cuzco fell, and after war came pestilence, leaving city and country uninhabitable, while the remnants of the Amauta people fled away to Tampu-Tocco, where they established themselves, leaving at Cuzco only a few priests who refused to abandon the shrine of the Sun. It was said that the art of writing was lost in this débâcle, and that the later art of reckoning by quipus, or knotted and coloured cords, was invented at Tampu-Tocco. Here, in a city free from pests and unmoved by earthquakes, the Kings of Tampu-Tocco reigned in peace, going occasionally to Cuzco to worship at the ancient shrine, over which, with its neighborhood, some shadowy authority was preserved. Finally a woman, Siyu-Yacu, of noble birth and high ambition, caused the report to be spread that her son, Rocca, had been carried off to be instructed by the Sun himself, and a few days later the youth, appearing in a garment glittering with gold, told the people that corruption of the ancient religion had caused their fall, but that their lost glories should be restored to them under his leadership. Thus Rocca became the first of the Incas, Cuzco was restored as capital, and the new empire started on a career which was to exceed the old in grandeur.
With the removal to Cuzco, Tampu-Tocco became no more than a monumental shrine where priests and vestals preserved the rites of the old religion and watched over the caves made sacred by the bones of former monarchs. The native writer Salcamayhua, who, like Garcilasso, makes Manco Capac the founder of the Incas (Montesinos regards Manco Capac I as the first native-born king of the Pirua dynasty), tells how "at the place of his birth he ordered works to be executed, consisting of a masonry wall with three windows, which were emblems of the house of his fathers, whence he descended"; and the name Tampu-Tocco actually means "Tavern of the Windows," windows being an unusual feature of Peruvian architecture. As the event proves, the commemorative wall is still standing.
In 1911, Hiram Bingham, the leader of the expedition sent out by Yale University and the National Geographical Society, discovered in the wild valley of the Urubamba, north of Cuzco, the ruins of a mountain-seated city, one of the most wonderful, and (in its natural context) beautiful ruins in the world. Machu Picchu the place is called, and its discoverer identifies it with the Tampu-Tocco of Inca tradition. One of its most striking features is a wall with three great windows; it contains cave-made graves and temples; bones of the more recent dead indicate that those who last dwelt in it were priestesses and priests; and it gives evidence of long occupation. The more ancient stonework is the more beautiful in execution, seeming to hark back to the masterpieces of Megalithic civilization; the later portion is in Inca style. Especially interesting is the discovery of record stones, associated with the older period, indicating that an earlier method of chronology had been replaced in later times, for it is to the reign of the thirteenth King of Tampu-Tocco that the invention of quipus is ascribed. Ideally placed as a city of refuge in a remote cañon, so that its very existence was unknown to the Spanish conquerors; seated on a granite hill unmoved by earthquakes; with its elaborate structures and complicated terraces indicating generations of residence, Machu Picchu represents the connecting link between the old and the new empires in Peru and gives a suddenly vivid plausibility to the traditions recorded by Montesinos.
PLATE XXXI.
Sculptured monolith from Chavin de Huantar, now in the Museum of Lima. The design appears to be a deity armed with thunderbolts or elaborate wands, with a monster head surmounted by an elaborate head-dress. If the figure be viewed reversed the head-dress will be seen to consist of a series of masks each pendent from the protruding tongue of the mask above, a motive frequent in Nasca pottery (cf. Plate [XXXII]). The figure strongly suggests the central image of the Tiahuanaco monolithic gateway, but it is to be observed that serpent heads, from the girdle, the rays of the head-dress, and in the caduceus-like termination of the head-dress, take the place of the puma, fish and condor accessories of the Tiahuanaco monument. The relationship of this deity to those represented on Plates [XXXII], [XXXIII], [XXXIV], [XXXV], and [XXXVII], is scarcely to be doubted. Markham, Incas of Peru, page 34.