Untangling an Accounting Tool and an Ancient Incan Mystery

[Judi Lynn]

Untangling an Accounting Tool and an Ancient Incan Mystery

By WILLIAM NEUMAN
JAN. 2, 2016


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Patricia Landa, an archaeological conservator, painstakingly cleans and untangles the khipus at her house in Lima.
Credit William Neuman/The New York Times
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LIMA, Peru — In a dry canyon strewn with the ruins of a long-dead city, archaeologists have made a discovery they hope will help unravel one of the most tenacious mysteries of ancient Peru: how to read the knotted string records, known as khipus, kept by the Incas.

At the site called Incahuasi, about 100 miles south of Lima, excavators have found, for the first time, several khipus in the place where they were used — in this case, a storage house for agricultural products where they appear to have been used as accounting books to record the amount of peanuts, chili peppers, beans, corn and other items that went in and out.

In some cases the khipus — the first ones were found at the site in 2013 — were buried under the remnants of centuries-old produce, which was preserved thanks to the extremely dry desert conditions. That was a blockbuster discovery because archaeologists had previously found khipus only in graves, where they were often buried with the scribes who created and used the devices. Many others are in the possession of collectors or museums, stripped of information relating to their provenance.

Khipus are made of a series of cotton or wool strings hanging from a main cord. Each string may have several knots, with the type and location of the knot conveying meaning. The color of the strands used to make the string and the way the strands are twisted together may also be part of the khipus’ system of storing and relaying information.

More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/03/world/americas/untangling-an-accounting-tool-and-an-ancient-incan-mystery.html?_r=0

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[krispos42]

1. I recall these being in a Clive Cussler book.

One of his Dirk Pitt novels. Something about how a boat's captain kept a log of his journey by the knots he tied in the strings of a thing like this.

Cool. I hope they can decipher it.