Page 527 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

to battalions of corvee laborers even makes
comprehensible the magnitude of this construc-
tion: dozens of cities and hundreds of way sta-
tions were built in less than a century. At one
level the symbolic significance of the easily
identifiable Inka architectural style also seems
clear. The buildings signified the state, its
rulers, and its activities. They identified entire
settlements with the state, contrasting them
with other settlements occupied by other
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groups in the same region. In some cases they
identified compounds or sectors of Inka occupa-
tion and activity within settlements built by
42
other groups. Just as textiles helped define
people and groups, architecture identified towns
and parts of towns.
Since architecture helps control and channel
human activities, the symbols it encoded
became part of the backdrop to the performance
of rites that reinforced and legitimized the state
to the people being incorporated into Tawantin-
suyu. The way some Inka towns and cities were
laid out mirrored certain principles of imperial
fig. 5. The sculpted grotto known as the royal mausoleum, below the Torreon at Machu Picchu
43
organization. Details of the rites and activities
in Inka centers are sketchy at best, but the pos-
sibility of a correspondence between town plans
and organizational principles is intriguing.
Such plans could have placed groups of people in
actual physical positions analogous to the posi-
tions the state envisioned for them in the new
order of sociopolitical relations it was creating.
Although architecture was involved in critical
ways with the identity of the state, it was less
standardized than were textiles or, more partic-
ularly, pottery. Town plans included many
common elements, but the combinations were
quite distinct; no two Inka towns were the
44
same. Even the execution of individual struc-
tures could offer surprisingly fresh departures:
the temple at Huaytara with its niches that are
trapezoidal in elevation and triangular in plan, 45
the kori kancha, with its curved enclosure and
46
extraordinary masonry, the megalithic wall at
Ollantaytambo.
Stone possessed special —in a sense sacred —
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qualities for the Inka. This is seen in the unu-
sual treatment of individual stones incorporated
into the walls of buildings and terraces. It
reaches its height in the treatment of living
fig. 6. The Inti-watana, a carved natural stone at Machu Picchu rock. In many cases living rock is incorporated
as part of a structure. The buildings are
adapted to natural features and the natural
features are incorporated into the cultural
reshape topography. The temple-for tress of tion to a stone echoing the shape of the moun- environment.
Saqsawaman and the terraces throughout the tains behind it, is as remarkable as the town's Living rock also appears as freestanding
sacred Urubamba Valley are primary examples. overall drama. sculpture. Visitors to the Cuzco region and
The entire site of Machu Picchu is a landscape Characteristics of Inka architecture that make other parts of the Inka realm have long admired
architecturally converted into a union of it so striking are relatively easy to list. Its con- these extraordinary stones. Whether
culture and nature. The sensitivity of detail struction techniques are also relatively well strikingly simple or complex, almost all are
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in the site, such as the platform that calls atten- understood. Knowing that the Inka had access enhanced by the landscapes in which they are
526 CIRCA 1492