Table of Contents

Introduction; Part I. Andean Media Prior to the Conquest: 1. Early Andean societies and semiotic practices; 2. Middle Horizon media and the emergence of the khipu; 3. The khipu and the Inca state; Part II. The Khipu in the Colonial Period, 1532–1650: 4. Khipu historiography and colonial chronicles; 5. Spanish visitas and administrative khipu; 6. The khipu and the colonial state; 7. Ecclesiastical khipu and Spanish evangelization; Conclusion.

Promotional Information

This book presents an interdisciplinary history of the khipu from pre-Hispanic times through 1650, based on archaeological evidence and published and unpublished historical sources.

About the Author

Galen Brokaw is Associate Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures at the University at Buffalo. He has previously taught at Lafayette College and as a visiting professor at Harvard University. Brokaw has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Social Science Research Council, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University. His articles have been published in Latin American Research Review, Colonial Latin American Review, Centennial Review, the Bulletin of the Comediantes, and other journals.