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| Quipu Khipu | |
|---|---|
 An Inca quipu, from the Larco Museum in Lima, Peru. | |
Time period | c. 2600 BCE – c. 1900 CE |
| Region | Central Andes |
Quipu (/ˈkiːpuː/ KEE-poo), also spelled khipu, are recording devices fashioned from knotted cords. They were historically used by various cultures in the central Andes of South America, most prominently by the Inca Empire.[1]
A quipu usually consists of cotton or camelid fiber cords, and contains categorized information based on dimensions like color, order and number.[2] The Inca, in particular, used knots tied in a decimal positional system to store numbers and other values in quipu cords. Depending on its use and the amount of information it stored, a given quipu may have anywhere from a few to several thousand cords.[3]
Objects which can unambiguously be identified as quipus first appear in the archaeological record during 1st millennium AD,[4] likely attributable to the Wari Empire.[5][6] Quipus subsequently played a key part in the administration of the Kingdom of Cusco of the 13th to 15th centuries, and later of the Inca Empire (1438–1533), flourishing across the Andes from c. 1100 to 1532. Inca administration used quipus extensively for a variety of uses: monitoring tax obligations, collecting census records, keeping calendrical information, military organization,[7] and potentially for recording simple and stereotyped historical "annales".[2]
It is not known exactly how many intact quipu still remain and where, as they were often stashed in ancient mausoleums.[4] However, a recent survey of both museum and private collection inventories places the total number of known extant pre-Columbian quipus at a little under 1400.[8]
After the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire, quipus were slowly replaced by European writing and numeral systems. Many quipus were identified as idolatrous and destroyed, but some Spaniards promoted the adaptation of the quipu recording system to the needs of the colonial administration, and some priests advocated the use of quipus for ecclesiastical purposes.[9] Today, quipus continue to serve as important items in several modern Andean villages.[10]
Various other cultures have used knotted strings, unrelated to South American quipu, to record information—these include, but are not limited to, Chinese knotting, and practiced by Tibetans, Japanese, and Polynesians.[11][12][13][14][15]
- ^ Neuman, William (January 2, 2016). "Untangling an Accounting Tool and an Ancient Inca Mystery". New York Times. Retrieved January 8, 2016.
- ^ a b Pärssinen, Martti (1992). Tawantinsuyu: The Inca State and Its Political Organization. SHS. pp. 26–51. ISBN 978-951-8915-62-4.
- ^ "Ancient Scripts: Quipu". www.ancientscripts.com.
- ^ a b Urton, Gary. (2011). "Tying the Archive in Knots, or: Dying to Get into the Archive in Ancient Peru
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
:3was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Cite error: The named reference
:4was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ D'altroy, Terence N. (2001). 18
- ^ Medrano, Manuel (2021-10-11). Quipus: Mil años de historia anudada en los Andes y su futuro digital (in Spanish). Planeta Perú. ISBN 978-612-319-672-1.
- ^ Brokaw, Galen (2010). A History of the Khipu. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521197793.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
:5was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ 平成29年度 琉球大学附属図書館・琉球大学博物館（風樹館）企画展 石垣市制施行70周年記念企画展. www.lib.u-ryukyu.ac.jp (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2021-06-04. Retrieved 2021-06-04.
- ^ "Das Arithmeum »Frühere Veranstaltungen» Warazan – Datenspeicher aus Stroh" (in German). 2006-02-06. Archived from the original on 2006-02-06. Retrieved 2021-06-04.
Dank der Bemühungen von Professor Kurayoshi Takara von der Ryûkyû-Universität in Japan gelangte das Arithmeum in den Besitz von äußerst seltenen japanischen Rechenhilfsmitteln, den 'Warazan'. Übersetzt bedeutet das: 'rechnen mit Stroh'.
- ^ 新唐書/卷216上 [New book of Tang]. Wikisource (in Chinese).
- ^ Quipu, page 99: " [...] one can use the phrase chieh sheng chi shih, which means 'the memorandum or record of knotted cords,' to refer to how Chinese writing evolved before characters were invented."
- ^ Goetzfridt, Nicholas J. (20 September 2007). "Polynesia". Pacific Ethnomathematics: A Bibliographic Study. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press. p. 26. ISBN 9780824874643.
[Elsdon] Best focuses on the use of knots (or quipus - a word he says originates from Peru, where knots were used similarly to Aotearoa/New Zealand, Hawaiʻi, and other parts of the Pacific) for tallying accounts, quantities of food, and conveying messages.