Public officials and regional or local lords were paid for their services to the empire in precious metals, fine textiles, and baskets of coca leaves. The Sapa Inca—the “only Inca,” or the ...

Ruled by an emperor, or Sapa Inca, who represented (and was descended from) the sun god, the Inca assimilated multiple regional tribes in a 300,000-square-mile area to produce a complex empire ...

In 1781, the revolutionary amaru-kataristas occupy the highlands of southern Peru. Sapa Inca, the last descendant of the Aymara Incas, and his wife Gregoria, decide to continue the indigenous ...

To the Incan eye, the landscape of their empire was riddled with shrines. Often these were inanimate objects like rocks and streams. But among the holiest places in the empire were mountain peaks ...