The Inca empire was one of the most powerful empires of pre-Columbian South America. However, this power didn’t come to them overnight; they had to work very hard to achieve such a great power. The Incas used many tools and weapons that they used to conquer others, but they used one that is very simple. Many people have overlooked it though; this process that was used was freeze-dried foods. Many people think that it was only recently invented in the 1960s, but it was not invented, or even thought of in a NASA lab. Annie Matthews says “as far back as 1200 A.D, the Incas freeze-dried potatoes” (Matthews). The Incas used many important inventions such as suspension bridges, terrace farming, and the calendar, but one main invention that drove the Incas to power was freeze-dried food. Freeze-dried foods is really helpful for us today, but it also was part of the reason that the Inca empire was so powerful.
The Incas were obviously not as advanced as we are today, so it is understandable that they would not freeze-dry food the same way that we do today. One of the main foods that the Incas freeze-dried was the potato. They picked the potato because, since it was grown underground, it was one of the only foods that could survive the harsh weather of the Andes. This freeze-dried potato was called chuño, but they also freeze-dried beef into a substance called charqui, which was a precursor to beef jerky (Food of the Incas). According to the author of thinkquest.org “after a matter of days, this dried potato pulp, known as chuño, was able to keep for up to one year” (Food of the Incas). Some may be wondering how they actually freeze-dried food. Since the Incas lived in the high elevations and low pressures of the Andes mountains, they could use these mountains to their advantage; they certainly did not pass up on that opportunity. They would take potatoes, or another food, up to the tops of the Andes mountains to freeze overnight, and during the day, when it got warmer, the low pressure would turn the frozen water that was inside of the food directly into water vapor. Usually, frozen water changes to a liquid and then a gas, but that is in highly pressurized areas. If the water inside of the food turned directly to a liquid, then the water would not evaporate.
The animals that were on the land were found to be basically fruits and vegetables. The Aztec’s and Inca’s seemed to eat only these things which were very healthy and good for their bodies. The Aztec’s and Incas seemed like a very well-devoted tribe to one another.
The sale of food products in the market of Tlatelolco with its various colors, shapes, smells, and sounds “unified Native American cuisines while preserving rich regional variations; [epitomized] the social relationships that depended on the feeding of gods and people; and [preserved] the cultural significance of taste for pre-Columbian cooking and eating” (9-10). Cuisine played an important part in the constructing of social hierarchies in Mesoamerica, and to this day continues to shape individuality not only in Mexico, but also for every country. Traditional forms of Mesoamerican cooking mainly belonged to women, and three simple utensils including a cazuela, a metate, and a comal, allowed them to frugally make delicious tortillas. But they “derived much of their self-worth from skill at the metate, the ability to grind maize so they could feed tortillas and tamales to their husbands and children,” (14-15). This single crop has permitted for these lower-class women to preserve and refine the pre-Columbian cuisine of tortillas and tamales. Mexicans have always been and still are a people of corn, in spite of numerous attempts to change this, partly in thanks to the female
Colombia is famous for many types of cuisine. In America, different states/areas are known for different types of food. For example, the coastline has great seafood and the south has awesome comfort food. Colombia is divided into 32 departments, or country subdivisions. Each area has unique dishes that reflect their department.
This article was very informative and interesting. The major point of interest is the condition of the alpaca mummies that had been buried for long periods of time. Another point of interest is the role that cloth played in the Inca empire. The cloth was coveted by the Incas. The Inca armies would burn the textile warehouses rather than allow their enemy to plunder this coveted good.
The Aztecs were a tribe that relied on corn a lot. Well, it wasn’t necessarily corn, it was actually a thing called maize. Maize is a corn like substance that they use for many things like tortillas that they could use to make other things with and put them with the tortillas. Some of this includes tomatoes, beans, squash, deer and other things. While the Aztecs relied on maize for many things, the Incas did not use at much corn as the Aztecs did. Instead their main diet was the food that there was when they traveled. The Incas had a very large spread of land that they traveled on. Instead of staying in one place the incas would get all the food from one place then they would go to another place and get all the food from there. After that they would go back to the original spot that they had been because all the food had grown
Upon arrival in the Americas, Europeans set out to make wheat the standard grain in the lands they had discovered; the establishment of wheat was both functional, as it was a staple of the European diet, as well as an attempt to institutionalize European control. While wheat did gain some ground in the Americas, especially among the upper classes, it failed to surmount maize as the “the foundation of indigenous livelihood.” The persistence of maize as a staple of the indigenous way of life is not shocking, as J. Eric Thompson writes: “Maize was a great deal more than the economic basis of Maya civilization: it was the focal point of worship, and to it every Maya who worked the soil built a shrine in his own heart.” The Americas were not
The typical Cuban cuisine and common food rituals have their origins mainly in Spanish dishes, like arroz con pollo (chicken and rice) and paella; pork is served in diverse forms, chicken, and rice, and seasoned with sofrito (a mix of spices).
The Aztec Empire stood for many years but never expanded much, only conquering small neighboring civilizations. The Aztec Empire was founded in the 6th century and didn’t fall until 1525. The Inca Civilization was a bit different. The Inca Civilization conquered as many lands that it could but quickly fell after just 100 years. In this essay I will be comparing the government, economics, and culture in the Aztec Civilizationand the Inca Empire.
Now that the environment of the Maya has been discussed and understood, the agriculture of the Maya is another important factor in the collapse of the Classic Maya. Domesticated crops that were currently being farmed at the time were corn, chiles, squash, beans, etc. Corn was a huge part of the Maya diet for the nobles and commoners, and responded positively to human intervention (Diamond, 2011, p.163). However, agriculture limitations arose with corn, such as a short storing period, one year, little nutrients, and the farming of corn was unproductive and require large amounts of labor (Diamond, 2011, p.165). An agricultural technique that was at first pr...
...c used a slash and burn style of farming and they relocated once the nutrients of the land were used up. The Incas were much more advanced. Labor specialization was common, especially in the large densely populated areas like Cuzco. The Incas made roads, had irrigation channels, fortresses, and mines. They used crop rotation and terracing and other advanced agricultural methods.
This reading was an excellent collection of articles, because it presented seven different views of the Incan empire. It does a good job of trying to idealize the Incas, justify their conquest by the Spanish, and label their government using modern terms. In retrospect, it is easy for us to look back at history and study it, but it is always a necessity to learn from what we study. If there is one thing to learn from the European conquest of the America's, it is that destroying a race of beings and their culture is an injustice to the conquered, and the conquerors.
This primary source tells the reader a great deal about the Incas. The Incas were extremely wealthy. Most of the document tells the reader about the wealth and riches of the Incas, describing their wealth in depth. Jobs in the Incas’ society included many lavish occupations. “[M]any silversmiths who did nothing but work rich pieces of gold or fair vessels of silver; large garrisons were stationed there, and a steward who was in charge of them all” (Pedro). The Incas were organized and intelligent. Large armies were set up to protect their villages, and they had plenty of silver and gold to experiment with and create new beautiful objects. They used their systems to create a fair,
The most important idea in Allen J. Christenson's Popol Vuh is maize or often known as corn but to the Maya culture, corn has a bigger significance than just food. Corn has played a important role in empires, civilizations and people for thousands of years. The Maya have a lot of admiration to corn as a cornerstone of their culture and spirituality. Maize was so highly admired that the Mayans had a Maize God. Corn was a gift from the Gods and cultivating it and planting it was a sacred duty it was a really important process in which corn was to be planted and harvested. Temples were built for Maize Gods and corn was used to nourish workers and kings. To the Mayans, the Gods made humankind out of maize. The Maya also considered this crop to be the vegetation of life in order to eat and grow. This symbolized the fragile nature of corn, a crop that depends entirely on human cultivation for its reproduction with such deep meaning and that has deep culture and meaning.
In the ruins of ancient Peru and Chili, the remains of potatoes dating back to 500 B.C. have been found. Potatoes were such a part of Incan life that they not only ate them, but they worshiped them. "O Creator! Thou who givest life to all things and hast made men that they may live, and multiply. Multiply also the fruits of the earth, the potatoes and other food that thou hast made, that men may not suffer from hunger and misery."- Incan Prayer used to worship potatoes.
This is because Peruvian cuisine is influenced by various cultures including those of the Inca Empire, Spanish conquistadors, and African slaves (lavidacomida.com). In the 1400s the natives from the Inca Empire sustained themselves mostly with corn, potatoes, and aji otherwise known as chili peppers. To this day Peru, also known as “The Potato Capital of the world”, is well known for its potatoes with 4,000 varieties (foodbycountry.com). Then in the 1500s the Spanish conquistadors led by Francisco Pizarro introduced new foods such as wheat, barley, beans, carrots, onions, chicken pork, and lam. However, the Spanish conquistadores also brought with them many diseases, which led to tons of natives dying and the fall of the Inca Empire. Diseases were not the only thing the Spanish conquistadors brought with them, they also brought many African slaves. This African slaves introduced new ways of cooking such as frying food. Another culture that greatly influenced Peruvian cuisine were he Chinese immigrants that arrived to build railroads in the 1800s (lacidacomida.com). The Chinese introduced ginger, soy sauce, and green onions. In addition, Peruvian cuisine has a lot of diversity due to Peru being divided into three regions, which are the coast, the Andean highlands, and Amazon rainforest. In the coast the climate is dry and seafood and stews are more prominent. In the highlands farming and