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By Martin St-Amant (S23678) - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8450312

DID  THE  INCAS HAVE  A  

WRITTEN  LANGUAGE?

Good morning! After such a snow bound time last week (over two feet/two thirds of a meter!), it has all melted, watering the ground deeply. The sun is out and the temperature is just right, not to hot not too cold. I love living here, ha ha! I hope and pray all of you have had a wonderful experience this past week whether it is weather related or not.

Speaking of nothing related above, I just listened to a video on the Inca civilization. For those of you who might not be

familiar with them, the Inca Empire is the ruling domain in pre-Columbian America. It spanned about 5,000 kilometers

Painting of Incan King. Wikipedea commons

and ruled at its height from the 1200’s to 1572 when it was conquered by the Spanish. The largest range of this empire stretched from modern-day Ecuador well into Chile. “This civilization was complex and absolutely massive…They built a system of roads and woven bridges to connect the land, built ziggurats that still astound engineers today, and left behind a bevy of artifacts for us to puzzle over. One such group of artifacts is known as ‘khipu.’ These are a system of knots tied into cords.”¹

It has long been thought by scholars that the Incan people could not write:

“The Incas lacked the use of wheeled vehicles. They lacked animals to ride and draft animals that could pull wagons and plows... [They] lacked the knowledge of iron and steel...

Courtesy of Answers in Genesis

Above all, they lacked a system of writing... Despite these supposed handicaps, the Incas were still able to construct one of the greatest imperial states in human history.— Gordon McEwan, The Incas: New Perspectives”²

But is that true? Recent studies have discovered that this civilization did indeed have a written system. Just not what we are used to. In fact it is an ingenious and complex arrangement of fibers and knots that present a 3-D view. And it is considered a tactical system because it is not just looked at, a person actually has to touch and feel the strings in order to decipher which animal fiber it is made out of. Thus giving more identity to what ever was being recorded. 

Cusco ruins,  capital of Inca, wikipedia commons

To date the system has not been able to be decoded. And no “rosetta stone,” so to speak, has been found either that can give us clues. One thought is, it is system for numbers possible to record tariff. However others believe it could be a record of constants of their language. Which ever one it is, or even something else. It shows high intelligence. 

Mankind has always been intelligent—this is just another example. Those who left Babel and travelled to South America to establish their own civilization and culture were made in the image of God with intelligence and ingenuity. They also had a God-given language that came from the division at the Tower of Babel. Genesis 5:1 says, ‘This is the book of the generations of Adam.’ There is no reason to believe that Adam, Noah, etc. did not have a written language/language system and could have handed documents down to Moses and later generations.”³ Notice the word book. 

Our different languages did not come from one gruntal half

Knot and fiber system of writing in the Incan language
Courtesy of Answers in Genesis

ape half human race. We all are descendants of Adam and Eve, created by the One True God (the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit) speaking on language until the scrambling occurred at the Tower of Babel. 

Until next time, God bless and take care!

Willow Dressel

References:

^1,3https://answersingenesis.org/human-evolution/could-the-inca-people-write/?utm_source=articlesmedia&utm_medium=email&utm_content=1-banner-cta&utm_campaign=20181208&mc_cid=0641607bd2&mc_eid=ec76e61712

²https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inca_Empire

By Martin St-Amant (S23678) - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8450312