Research TOCwps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/12330/12626747/myanthropol… · ments include Maya...

CLOTH PRODUCTION

AND GENDER

RELATIONS

IN THE INKA EMPIRE

Cathy Lynne Costin

Research TOC

Since the 1960s, archaeologists have worked at developingmethodologies to identify and analyze variability within andbetween ancient societies. Prior to that time, most “tradi-

tional” archaeologists—and, more generally, anthropologists—approached the cultures they studied as though they were homo-geneous units of mind and behavior, making the implicitassumption that everyone within a society thought the same andacted in the same sorts of ways. The “new” approach to archaeol-ogy explicitly acknowledged many forms and causes of culturalheterogeneity: geographic and environmental differences, occu-pational differences and specialization, class and wealth differ-ences. Although some argue that the potential for incorporatingthese ideas has yet to be fully achieved,1 most archaeologiststoday recognize that individuals of different occupation, class, orplace of residency engage in different activities, pursue differentstrategies for survival and success, and are likely to be affecteddifferently by the actions of others within and outside their soci-eties.

Recently, some archaeologists have begun to include anotherdimension of social variability in their research. This dimension isgender, the distinction between feminine and masculine.2 In allhuman societies women and men do different things and arethought about in different ways. Because of this, it is probable thatthey will contribute to, as well as experience, cultural change indifferent ways. To gloss over or ignore this fundamental differenceis to miss an important dynamic of social process.

But how can we identify and analyze how gender helpedstructure ancient societies? After all, the people we study aredead! We cannot directly observe people making tools, stirringfood, growing crops, selling wares at the market, or deciding todeclare war or sue for peace in order to document and analyzegendered differences in behavior. Even more invisible—so theargument goes—is what people thought about gender: the relativevalues placed on the products of men’s and women’s labor, theiractivities, and their very lives. It is important that we do notassume that gender-based behavior, personality, status, and treat-ment have been universal across space and time or that they con-form to twentieth-century Western ideals. Rather, we mustdevelop methods to identify and explain the similarities and dif-ferences in the ways men and women acted, participated, andwere treated in ancient societies.3 In the remainder of this chapterI will present the wealth of data we can use to study gender dif-ferences in ancient societies, just as we can analyze other keydimensions of variability such as occupation, settlement, and

3

class. I will do so with examples from my own research on theimmediately pre-Inka and Inka societies of the Yanamarca Valleyin the Central Highlands of Peru.

DATA APPROPRIATE FOR THE STUDY

OF GENDER IN ANCIENT SOCIETIES

There are many categories of data that can be used to study gen-der differences in past societies. We can broadly divide these intoethnohistorical and archaeological data. Ethnohistory is a termused by both anthropologists and historians to refer to the recon-struction of native cultures from written sources. There are manytypes of sources available to the ethnohistorian. First are indige-nous documents. These come from ancient civilizations thatdeveloped their own writing systems. The earliest of these docu-ments include Maya hieroglyphic texts; Mesoamerican pictorialbooks (called codices); Mesopotamian cuneiform texts;Mycenaean clay tablets; and Egyptian hieroglyphic texts. Thesesources are particularly informative because they present theinsiders’ view. The audience for whom these documents werewritten was that small segment of society that was literate,namely the elites. Hence, the topics covered were those thatwould be of most interest to them, such as elite genealogies, mili-tary and political histories, taxation and other economic matters,and state religious ritual and belief.

The second category of ethnohistoric sources are transcribednative oral traditions. Like native written documents, they wereprobably composed and/or maintained by the elite. These textsinclude myths, legends, poetry, literature, genealogical histories,legal codes, and other bodies of information traditionally retainedby memory but eventually written down.

A third category of ethnohistoric sources consists of firsthandaccounts and descriptions by outsiders such as traders, explorers,missionaries, and conquerors.

A fourth category of ethnohistorical data consists of colonialadministrative documents, including censuses, official question-naires, tribute lists, court transcripts, and legal codes. Many ofthese documents exist because colonial administrators often relied

4 RESEARCH FRONTIERS

upon indigenous forms of labor organization, tax collection, andadministration to achieve their ends, and the native systems incor-porated into the colonial structure were recorded in an attempt toregularize and standardize them. Indigenous peoples also soughtto take advantage of new legal systems to preserve and advancetheir own interests, and their testimony to courts and judicialadvocates about title to land, rights of access to resources, marriagepatterns, inheritance rules, and other practices is preserved inarchives around the world.

None of these ethnohistoric sources is without problemsand/or biases. For most, the topics and domains covered are nar-row, usually focusing primarily on things of interest to the rulingclass. The information in both native and colonial documents wasoften collected from and recorded by men—usually upper-classmen—and therefore most ethnohistoric sources represent the view-point and practices of only a small segment of society.

One of the main problems with colonial sources is that theyrarely represent the native point of view. Few of these works areconsciously objective “ethnographic” investigations of native cul-ture. Outsiders sometimes failed to comprehend what they werewitnessing and often were contemptuous of the practices theyobserved. For both native and colonial texts, we have problems oftranslation. These problems include our own ability to decipherand translate ancient texts as well as errors in translation made bythose who compiled oral histories and recorded native languagesand practices many centuries ago. The third problem is one ofimprecision in chronological and spatial focus. Oral histories—which are often passed down with modification for hundreds ofyears—may combine attitudes and practices that pertain to differ-ent eras. Similarly, colonial chronicles and administrative docu-ments may indiscriminately record the practices of differentregions and/or subgroups without noting where or from whomthe information was obtained. We need to evaluate the veracity,reliability, and usefulness of each source, taking into account whenit was written, where it was written, for whom it was written, whyit was written, and the background of the writer.

Despite their shortcomings, the documentary sources are par-ticularly valuable as sources of certain kinds of information, espe-cially for those intangibles of culture that often leave no materialrecord. These include rules, ideas, abstract beliefs, marriage pat-terns and practices, systems of access to resources, and historicalinformation. Many aspects of gender—including the division of

5CLOTH PRODUCTION AND GENDER RELATIONS IN THE INKA EMPIRE

labor and gender ideology—are among the topics that can beaccessed with ethnohistoric data.

I have found that ethnohistorical materials are particularly use-ful when used in conjunction with archaeological data. The advan-tage of archaeological data is that, if collected and analyzed appro-priately, these data do not suffer from the same types of problemsdiscussed for the documentary materials. First, archaeologicalmaterials are more broadly representative of the society as a whole.We should be able to recover the garbage of rich and poor, menand women, children and adults, farmers and priests, villagers andcity-dwellers. Also, since most human activities leave some sort ofmaterial record, the archaeological data may reflect a wider varietyof activities than do the ethnohistoric data: from the mundane,humdrum acts necessary for daily survival to the great pageantryand spectacle of ritual and nobility.

Second, the archaeological data themselves are more objective.The processes of deposit formation—loss, discard, and abandon-ment—are rarely consciously manipulated to present an image orbias an opinion; neither is there self-reflective commentary in pat-terns of deposit. That is, people rarely worry about the image theycreate when they throw out their trash (because they don’t expectanyone to really look at it, let alone scientifically analyze it to recre-ate their lifestyle).

The archaeological record is not without its drawbacks andlimitations, however. Not all things people use preserve equallywell over the centuries. Organic materials are much less likely to bepreserved than nonorganic materials. This can lead to an incorrectinterpretation of a culture. For example, if we recover all the stonetools but none of the wooden ones, we may incorrectly reconstructthe range of activities people pursued. Similarly, some organicmaterials preserve better than others, so that animal bones (whichrepresent the flesh component of the diet) may be well repre-sented, while botanical remains (which represent the vegetal com-ponent of the diet) may not be recovered. Such a pattern of recov-ery may cause us to overestimate dependence on meat andunderestimate the importance of plant foods in the diet. Similarly,there may be some parts of culture that are invisible in the archaeo-logical record because they do not have a direct, material compo-nent. Language and beliefs are two often cited examples, but otheritems include marriage and kinship patterns, property systems,and historical data. Also, there are parts of the archaeologicalrecord that are not immediately identifiable and interpretable,


often because they have no modern counterpart to which we cancompare them, or because the record is incomplete or ambiguous.“What is this?” is probably among the most frequently asked ques-tions in the field and in the lab. Problems of objectivity and reliabil-ity figure in the analysis, and it is incumbent on us to use rigorousand appropriate methodologies for drawing our conclusions aboutthe past.

Despite these problems, archaeological data can be used tostudy gender. In fact, there are five general categories of archaeo-logical data pertinent to the study of sex/gender. The first is skele-tal data. While most sex differences are expressed in soft tissues(which are rarely recovered), it is also possible to use the shape andsize of some bones to identify the sex of an adult with reasonableaccuracy. Examination of bone can yield information about age atdeath; number of pregnancies (obviously, females only); trauma;stress; diet and malnutrition; and some infectious and degenerativediseases. These analyses provide straightforward information onthe physical well-being, activities, differential care, prestige, andstatus of men and women.

The second category of archaeological data that may reflectgender differences consists of grave goods—the objects withwhich individuals were buried. Archaeologists assume that thesereflect some of the basic activities the individual participated in inlife (or at least those activities ideologically or symbolically associ-ated with his/her social category); and his or her status and pres-tige.

The third category of data consists of two-dimensional orthree-dimensional figurative representations, which may recordinformation about gender differences in activities and status. Aswith most archaeological materials, some artistic traditions are eas-ier to interpret than others. For example, the division of labor isfairly easy to identify from images painted on the walls of ancientEgyptian tombs,4 while the nature and meaning of Paleolithicfemale “Venus” figures remains enigmatic.5

The fourth category of data consists of various artifacts them-selves. We must first try to determine which particular artifactsand/or activities were regularly associated with which gender. Wecan then compare this with the variable distribution of these arti-facts and activities throughout time and location. This will enableus to identify changes in the location of particular activities, the rel-ative intensities of activities in different periods or different com-munities, changes in people’s work loads, and changes in activity


scheduling. All of these things may in turn affect economic andsocial relationships.

The fifth category of archaeological data consists of analysis ofactivity patterns in their spatial and architectural contexts. Theidentification of certain activities and artifacts with certain individ-uals permits discussion of where those activities took place. Wecan consider the degree to which certain activities are domestic orpublic, unrestricted or secluded, universal or limited. We can thenfurther discuss the impact any restrictions may have on people’slives and on other activities they may pursue.

In sum, we students of the past are lucky in that archaeologyand ethnohistory generally have complementary strengths, errors,and omissions. They can thus be combined quite effectively for thestudy of the past. The two types of data often cover differentdomains and aspects of society. Second, the archaeological and eth-nohistorical records were generally formed independently of oneanother, and so should not contain the same errors, biases, andomissions. Of the roughly nine different categories of data, I usedseven in my study of Wanka and Inka gender.

RESEARCH BACKGROUND

The archaeological data discussed in this essay were collected bythe Upper Mantaro Archaeological Research Project (UMARP).UMARP was established in 1977 to study culture changes in theYanamarca Valley of highland Peru (see Figure 1). We were par-ticularly interested in the development of small scale chiefdomsamong the indigenous Wanka ethnic group between A.D. 1300and 1470, and the effects of the Inka conquest, which occurred inabout A.D. 1470, on the local population. The project memberswere an international team, each of whom contributed theirexpertise in an area of data collection and/or materials analysis(pottery, lithics, animal bone, botanical remains, architecture,etc.).

To achieve our goal of reconstructing and explaining change inWanka society, we collected archaeological data from sites thatpertained to the immediately pre-Inka period (which we callWanka II), and the period during which the Wanka populationwas under Inka domination (which we dubbed Wanka III). Surface



Figure 1Map of the Upper Mantaro Archaeological

Research Project Research Area

collections were made at over thirty sites, and intensive excava-tions were conducted at seven of those sites. In our excavations, wefocused our efforts on houses and their adjoining “private” patiospace. We excavated in thirty-one households. Although this is anextremely small fraction of the tens of thousands of householdsthat populated the region, because we used scientific samplingprocedures we believe that the sample is probably representativeof the Wanka population as a whole.

We recovered, catalogued, and analyzed hundreds of thou-sands of artifacts and ecofacts. In all, approximately 300,000 pot-tery sherds, 50,000 stone artifacts, 80,000 animal bones, many kilosof botanical materials, 106 human burials, and hundreds of piecesof metal and shell comprise the dataset from which we drew ourconclusions about Wanka and Inka society in the Yanamarca. Inaddition, we analyzed the architecture and settlement patterns ofthe communities from which we collected our data. All the materi-als were processed and catalogued in Peru. Computer analyses ofthe data were conducted at UCLA.

When we developed our research design, we were careful toinclude methods of data collection and analysis that would allowus to discuss differences in the Wanka population in terms ofsocioeconomic class, occupation, and community type. However,to be honest, we did not include gender as an analytic category inour original research and therefore did not explicitly collect data toaddress gender-related issues. It was not until a decade later that Irealized we should have included gender as an analytic category! Itis a credit to the potency of our research design—which generateddata to address a wide variety of questions, including some notanticipated when the research began—that I was able to expandour analytic categories and pursue this “gender-informed”research.

Let me digress for a minute, to discuss the non-gendered con-clusions we drew from our analyses.6 As mentioned above, theWanka were the native inhabitants of the Yanamarca Valley. Atabout A.D. 1300, they developed a chiefdom level society, probablyas the indirect result of intensified warfare among communities.We infer a high level of conflict among the Wanka from the loca-tions and configurations of their settlements. Most people lived inwalled/fortified communities located on knolls high above thevalley floor, where they could easily defend themselves. This con-clusion is supported by ethnohistoric documents that report ahigh degree of warfare among the Wanka prior to the Inka con-


quest.7 There was some socio-economic stratification in the WankaII period. We differentiate between elite and commoner house-holds on the basis of house size, location, and the quantities andtypes of artifacts recovered in those households. According to thedocumentary sources, the Wanka lords (called sinchi) initiallyachieved their positions of power and authority as successful lead-ers in battle.8 We can also identify a settlement hierarchy. Therewere people living in both large towns and smaller villages. Theethnohistoric documents tell us nothing about the division of laborand occupational specialization during the Wanka II period.However, our archaeological work did identify some occupationaldifferences among the pre-Inka population. Based on the distribu-tion of tools used for agriculture, pottery making, stone working,and weaving, we determined that most people were farmers.However, there were some households that specialized part-timein pottery production, stone tool production, and perhaps textileproduction.

As recorded in the colonial-era chronicles, the Wanka wereconquered by the Inka during the reign of the Inka EmperorPachakuti (in about A.D. 1470) as a part of that leader’s explosivemilitary expansion through the Andes. After the Inka conquest,the area was transformed physically and organizationally. Welearn from documentary sources that the region was incorporatedas a province within the Empire. The state sent a governor andmany bureaucrats from the imperial capital of Cuzco to establishInka rule. These rulers built a new administrative center (thearchaeological site of Hatun Xauxa) and set up a provincial gov-ernment. Some local Wanka rulers were given low-level positionsin the Inka provincial bureaucracy. There was a change in thenature and structure of socioeconomic class differences. The Inkaconquerors (bureaucrats and military personnel) formed theuppermost level in Yanamarca society. Although the Wanka elitewere able to maintain their wealth and power differentiationfrom the commoners, the local lords lost much of their indepen-dence, in that they obtained their power and wealth as vassals ofthe Inka state. This dependence on the conquerors is reflectedmaterially in the fact that the Wanka elites became great imitatorsof all things Inka.9 They used large quantities of imitation Inkapottery and built Inka-style additions to their homes.10

Interestingly, the archaeological data indicate that while overallstatus differences continued, the commoners were in some waysbetter off under the Inkas. For example, the higher quantities of


maize and animal bones found in Inka period houses comparedwith that found in pre-Inka houses suggests commoners had bet-ter diets after the conquest. Similarly, higher frequencies of certaintypes of pottery and other artifacts indicate increased access tosome types of material goods with Inka domination. Finally, com-parative analyses of skeletal remains indicate commoners experi-enced slightly better health and longer lifespans after the Inkaconquest.11

In our study of settlement patterns, we identified changes incommunity location and structure. Most fundamentally, peoplemoved out of the large, walled Wanka II hill towns into smaller vil-lages closer to agricultural lands near the valley bottom. This movelikely increased agricultural productivity—since people didn’thave to spend an hour or more commuting each day. The breakupof the fortified towns also enhanced the Inka’s ability to control thelocal population, since the Wanka could not retreat behind theirwalls to plot and carry out a rebellion. Finally, the shift from thedense, crowded towns may have contributed to the generally bet-ter health experienced by the Wanka after the Inka conquest.

The ethnohistoric sources provide some information about thecraft artisans who worked for the Inka government, but providelittle information regarding those artisans who produced utilitar-ian goods for local consumption. However, the archaeological dataprovide a wealth of information about craft producers. From thesedata, we recognize changes in the occupational structure of Wankasociety after the Inka conquest. Most basically, the economybecame more specialized as people in some villages focused inten-sively on agriculture while in other villages most householdsfocused more intensively on craft production, such as pottery mak-ing or stone-tool making.

WANKA GENDER RELATIONS: CLOTH

The foregoing discussion demonstrates that we can reconstructquite a bit about social and economic differences within a givencultural group, and we can document how cultural change—in thiscase, change brought about by the Inka conquest—affects differentsocial groups in different ways. Can we also explore how the Inkaconquest affected women and men differently? Yes!

In my own research, I have combined ethnohistorical and


archaeological data to study gender relations as reflected in onesmall slice of ancient life: cloth production. By engendering my dis-cussion of textile production, I have been able to explore the divi-sion of labor, the nature of the economic and political process, andsocial relations.

The first step I took in my work was to identify each sex/gen-der with certain activities, symbols, and/or places. Unfortunately,the burial data from the UMARP excavations were of minimal usein identifying sex/gender differences in the Wanka and Inka popu-lations. There were few strong associations between artifacts ofknown function or symbolism and a particular sex. Also, there waslittle in the way of artistic data that could be used in the study, asneither the Wanka nor the Inka had strong figurative artistic tradi-tions.

However, the ethnohistoric documents are rich in their discus-sion of sex/gender patterns and differences and therefore offer astarting point from which to conduct the analysis. The pre-colonialAndean peoples were nonliterate; therefore, there are nonative/indigenous written sources from which to draw informationpertaining to a time prior to the Spanish conquest. However, we dohave a variety of early Spanish documents from which we can drawinformation. The Inka had a rich oral tradition, which was recordedsoon after the Spanish conquest of Peru. Second, we have a largebody of legal documents, including censuses, official questionnaires(visitas), and court documents. Finally, we have a relatively largecorpus of diaries, letters, and other written works of the Spanishconquerors, later European administrators, and literate natives.

The ethnohistoric documents provide information on the gen-eral division of labor along both age and gender lines. Ideally, chil-dren and adults of both genders had specific tasks they wereexpected to perform. Young girls were expected to carry water, col-lect herbs and flowers (for cooking and dyeing), help with thecooking, and watch their younger siblings; young boys wereexpected to trap birds and other small animals, carry wood, andherd. Adult men and women both worked in the agriculturalfields, but at somewhat different tasks: Men plowed and helpedwith the harvest, while women planted, weeded, and harvested.Men also built houses and other structures and served in the army.Women were responsible for cooking food, brewing beer, andwatching small children. Females of all ages performed varioustasks associated with cloth production, such as spinning threadand weaving (see Figure 2).


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Wea

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It was the study of cloth production that led me to the study ofgender in Wanka and Inka society. As the person on the projectresponsible for the analysis of all ceramic artifacts, it fell to me tosay something interesting about several thousand round, perfo-rated objects recovered consistently in our excavations (see Figure3). I quickly identified these as spindle whorls, which are weightsused in the spinning process to keep the thread tight and even (seeFigure 2a). Having identified these objects with a specific activity, Ibegan my investigations of that activity (spinning), its final prod-uct (cloth), and the people who made that product.

The ethnohistoric documents make clear the extreme impor-tance and value of cloth and cloth production in Wanka and Inkasocieties. Cloth—in the highlands woven primarily of llama andalpaca wool—was obviously necessary for survival. Cloth had arole in many important ceremonies and rituals, including pubertyrites, marriage, and burial. Cloth was also the primary form ofwealth in most Andean societies, which had no money as we knowit.


Figure 3Spindle Whorls

Because the pre-Columbian Andean peoples had no truemoney or coinage, the activities of the government were financedin kind (goods such as food items, pottery, and especially cloth).Revenues were raised by imposing tribute levies on subordinatepopulations. For example, when the Inka conquered a new terri-tory they imposed a cloth tax on the local population. Each villagewas required to produce a certain amount of cloth to be turnedover to state tax collectors on a regular basis. The cloth requisi-tioned by the state was used to clothe men serving in the army andto “pay” or reward bureaucrats and other personnel working forcivilian and military institutions. State tax collectors told local lead-ers how much cloth to produce, and these leaders then divided thework among the villagers under their control. Not surprisingly, thecloth tax burden fell on the “traditional” spinners and weavers,that is, on girls and women. Thus, in addition to spinning andweaving to make clothing and blankets for their own families—asthey had done before the Inka conquest—women under the Inkaadditionally spun thread and wove cloth that was turned over tostate tax collectors.12

The ethnohistoric documents tell us that most cloth was man-ufactured in a domestic setting and that women were the primaryproducers of thread and cloth.13 Given the strength of the associa-tion between weaving and women in Inka (and likely pre-Inka)society, I would argue that the study of cloth production providesan ideal way to study women in particular and gender relationsmore generally in Inka society. I make the leap from technologyand production to social relations for the following reason. Clothwas a good that was produced in part for exchange. People whoexchange goods must have some sort of an economic and socialrelationship. Asking questions about the nature of productionultimately gives us information about the nature of those eco-nomic and social relationships. Given this argument, our nextquestions become: How can we see cloth production archaeologi-cally? What can the study of cloth production tell us about theeffects of the Inka conquest on women’s labor and gender rela-tions?

In the Andes, the tools and materials associated with cloth pro-duction that were recovered by archaeologists include spindlesand whorls used in thread production, pieces of the simple back-strap looms favored by Andean women, and needles used in fin-ishing and embellishing woven cloth. On the coast of Peru wherethe dry climate leads to unusually good preservation of organic


materials, my colleagues often recover a wide variety of tools asso-ciated with weaving, including entire “weaver’s baskets” repletewith unspun wool, half-finished thread, wooden spindles, andother accoutrements. Unfortunately, the cool, damp conditions ofthe highlands where I conducted my investigations do not pro-mote such preservation. Thus, I have virtually no cloth, raw wool,spun yarn, or tools made out of perishable materials available foranalysis.

The primary archaeological data I used consisted of severalthousand ceramic spindle whorls, several dozen bone and metalneedles, and a few ambiguous bone tools that may have served asthread bobbins, shuttles, or battens. I combined an analysis of thedistribution of these artifacts (and their association with otheractivities) with ethnohistoric descriptions of cloth specifically andInka society more generally to understand how cloth productionchanged over time, its contexts of production and distribution, andhow this all affected women (and their relations with men). I usedthe relative numbers of tools recovered in different households todetermine whether and how the amount of cloth production variedby site, class, and time period.

First, I reconstructed pre-Inka cloth production as a baselineagainst which to test changes after the Inka conquest. We foundspindle whorls in all Wanka II households, which I interpret tomean that all households—and, therefore, I presume all females—spun and made cloth. Whorls were not, however, evenly distrib-uted. Some households had significantly more whorls than others,suggesting some households—and therefore some females—worked more at cloth production than did others. The intensity ofproduction varied in two ways. First, the density of whorlsincreased with elevation. This indicates that women living closer tothe high elevation puna grasslands—where the Andean villagerskept their flocks of wool-bearing llamas and alpacas—spun morethread and possibly made more cloth than did villagers living fur-ther from good pastures. I propose a straightforwardecological/environmental explanation for this pattern: Peopleexploited most intensively those resources located closest to wherethey lived.

Second, elite households yielded twice the density of whorlsas did commoner households. This pattern supports a conclusionthat elite women made more cloth than did commoner women.This is an interesting observation that requires further discussion,as it is at odds with our twentieth-century Western perception that


wealthy women enjoy great leisure. I turned to the ethnohistoricrecord for an explanation of this pattern. The colonial-era docu-ments describing pre-Inka and Inka society indicate that elitesgenerally did not work at hard labor in the agricultural fields, butthis does not mean that they did nothing all day. Rather thanbeing idle, I argue that elite women spent their time weaving, aconclusion that is indirectly supported by statements in the docu-ments describing the wives, daughters, and other female relativesof leaders as weaving intensively.14 Considering what we knowabout the importance of cloth as a measure of wealth in Andeansocieties, we see that women and girls created wealth for theirfamilies by using their time and labor to turn raw fiber into valu-able cloth.

The cloth created by women was an important part of theAndean political process as well as an economic asset. We learnfrom the documentary sources that powerful families gave awaylarge quantities of cloth as a way of creating alliances, enlargingtheir power bases, and rewarding loyal followers.15 Cloth distribu-tion took place as a part of large feasts sponsored and hosted byelite families.16 Archaeological materials help us identify the loca-tions of these feasts. The distribution of bowls used to serve specialfoods and drinks indicates that these feasts took place within elitehouses, rather than in some other nondomestic, public place. SinceWanka houses were built in such a way that no one could besecluded in an inaccessible part of the house, all members of thehousehold sponsoring the feast must have been present at andlikely participated in the activities. Thus, elite women—as the cre-ators of textile wealth—directly contributed to and participated inthe political strategies of their families.

Using the Wanka II data and conclusions as a baseline in theanalysis, I then asked: What happened after the Inka conquest?Several interesting patterns emerged from the data. First, the num-ber of spindle whorls recovered in Wanka III households is twicethat recovered in Wanka II households. From this I conclude thatthe overall amount of spinning doubled after the Inka conquest. Ibelieve this reflects the Inka cloth tax described in the colonial doc-uments. There is no indication—archaeological or ethnohistoric—that women were freed from any other tasks to make more time forspinning and weaving. Thus, it would appear that the productionof thread and cloth to meet state demands was accomplished inaddition to all the other work for which women were responsible.By combining evidence from documentary sources and archaeo-


logical data, we might conclude that women worked harder andlonger under Inka domination.

A second pattern that emerged is that, after the conquest, elitewomen were no longer making more cloth than commonerwomen: We recover roughly the same number of whorls in WankaIII commoner and elite households. The significance of this changewill become clear in the subsequent discussion.

The changes in cloth production were accompanied bychanges in distribution. Cloth retained its important economic andpolitical functions, but the location of distribution and the identi-ties of those who participated in its distribution changed. Clothdistribution no longer took place within a household context(where women would invariably have been involved). Rather,cloth was removed from the local villages and taken to regionalInka storage facilities and to the capital of the Empire itself, fromwhere it was redistributed. In fact, the colonial-era documentsmake clear that all fine cloth “belonged” to the emperor (no matterwho made it). Technically, people could obtain it only as a giftfrom the state.

As in pre-Inka times, large amounts of cloth were given awayduring official feasts and festivities, but the sponsorship andnature of these events changed after the Inka conquest. The num-ber of large bowls and other artifacts associated with feasting felldramatically in Wanka III household contexts, indicating that localWanka lords no longer hosted large feasts and large cloth give-aways within their homes. Rather, the Inka governors and statebureaucrats assumed this role, which was carried out in large pub-lic plazas at Inka administrative centers.

Under Inka domination, cloth distribution became an increas-ingly masculine activity on both the giving and receiving ends. Itis clear from the ethnohistoric sources that all Inka bureaucrats—including the tax collectors and administrators who distributedcloth—were male. My colleague Christine Hastorf has presentedimportant evidence that women did not attend the state-spon-sored feasts—the events where cloth was distributed—as fre-quently as did men. Hastorf’s analysis of bones from Inka-periodgraves indicates women ate less maize (corn) than did men.17 Thechemical composition of women’s bones closely reflects the typesand proportions of foods recovered in domestic settings, indicat-ing women mostly ate at home. In contrast, men consumed moremaize than was served up at home. Hastorf concludes that menwere “eating out” more than women. In the Andes, maize was


often consumed as chicha beer, which was a key component ofelaborate state-sponsored feasts. In sum, the skeletal and botanicaldata provide circumstantial evidence that men were partying(feasting) more than women. If women were attending fewerfeasts, they may not have been the direct recipients of cloth as fre-quently as men. Likely, women would have received state-distrib-uted cloth from their male relatives (husbands, brothers, fathers,sons) who did attend the feasts. This established a new set ofdependencies, whereby women could not directly obtain necessaryand/or valuable goods for themselves, but had to rely on others(men) for them.

Women were not directly distributing or receiving cloth, andthey may not have been the ultimate consumers of this fine clotheither. Very few of the textiles that women made have survived:The organic materials from which they were made decomposedlong ago. However, virtually all that have survived the last fivehundred years are men’s shirts.18 Based on the increase in textileproduction activities and the lack of evidence that women wereweaving for themselves, we might conclude that under Inka domi-nation women increased their labor but presumably did not benefitfrom it directly. Under Inka domination, Wanka women producedmore but consumed less of what they produced.

Let us return now to the specific labor taxes imposed on theconquered population. Ethnohistoric documents indicate thatwomen wove cloth and brewed beer. The archaeological evidenceindicates that they did much of this work within their own houses.Women, however, were not the only ones who worked harderunder Inka domination. The men were also taxed. Most commonly,men worked in state agricultural and construction projects outsidetheir homes. Although both women and men were taxed, therewas a structural difference in the nature of men’s and women’staxes: Women worked in a domestic setting, while men worked ina more public context. It was the latter type of work that wasrewarded with preferred foods such as meat, maize, and chichaduring and after state service. Thus, while everyone “paid taxes”by producing goods and providing services for the state, menreceived greater rewards for that labor.

As the nature of cloth production and distribution changed,women became further removed from direct participation in thepolitical process. The fine cloth that elite women wove went nottoward their own families’ political activities, but to the state,which generally excluded women from the larger political and


bureaucratic functions. Irene Silverblatt and others have arguedthat the pre-Inka Andean ideology viewed men and women ascomplementary—each working for the benefit of the other withinthe domestic unit and within the society.19 But under Inka domina-tion we see an increasing flow of highly desirable goods (such ascloth and preferred foods) from women to men, without a comple-mentary increase in the flow of valuable “masculine” products towomen. Women also lost control over the products of their labor,as these items were increasingly distributed outside the home bymen unrelated to the female producers. At the same time, womenmay have become more dependent on men for the acquisition ofnecessary and valued items, such as cloth.

To follow through on this line of thought, I ask one last ques-tion: How might this change in the distribution of goods havechanged household and social structure and gender relations ingeneral? The increasingly lopsided apportionment of privilegesand dependencies surely must have disrupted the formerly bal-anced, complementary gender relations of the Andes. We can spec-ulate that there might have been an increase in tension betweenmen and women as women produced more beer and cloth but par-ticipated less in the public activities in which these goods were dis-tributed. Might the Inka conquest have begun to set men andwomen in opposition to each other instead of seeing themselves asworking together? Returning to the original hypothesis that menand women experience culture change differently, men andwomen would probably have different degrees of acceptance of orresistance to Inka domination in part because they experiencedtheir tax burdens differently. A differential, gender-based reactionto Inka rule may have spawned more gender-conscious policies ofgovernance and administration, which might then change tradi-tional Andean society even further.

CONCLUSIONS

I hope that the foregoing discussion has demonstrated the strengthof combining archaeological and ethnohistorical inquiry in ourstudies of the past. Frankly, my discussion could not be as vivid,my conclusions not as detailed, if I did not have both types of data


from which to draw. My students often ask me what conclusions Imight have reached had I not had the ethnohistorical materials tocomplement my archaeological data. My archaeological data onthe Wanka (and Inka) are probably insufficient to engender activi-ties—including cloth production—in the first place and certainlynot to the degree they are made gender specific in the ethnohistori-cal literature. I could have studied cloth production using onlyarchaeological data, but could not have derived the conclusionsabout the gendered division of labor, gender relations, andwomen’s power (or lack thereof).

At the same time, the documentary sources alone are alsoinsufficient to generate these conclusions. The ethnohistoricalrecord provides virtually no information on patterns of variabilityin cloth production. For example, in discussions of the location ofcloth production, there is no distinction made between elite andcommoner, high- and low-altitude villages. Similarly, there is littlein the documents on how the cloth tax was implemented, theactual burden it created, or the effects of changes in cloth distribu-tion on local populations. There is little in the documents on theseemingly “incidental” information—such as diet and the locationsof feasts—which ends up being crucial for piecing together thestory of gendered socioeconomic relationships and politicalprocess. Archaeological and ethnohistorical data are frequently—indeed usually—used independently of one another. In manycases, it is because we have available to us only one or the other,but not both. As this work shows, however, when both can beemployed, the old proverb holds true: The whole is clearly greaterthan the sum of the parts.

NOTES

1. See, for example, Elizabeth Brumfiel, “Distinguished Lecture inArchaeology: Breaking and Entering the Ecosystem—Gender,Class, and Faction Steal the Show,” American Anthropologist 94(1992): 551–567.

2. Although the two terms are often used interchangeably, sex andgender are two different phenomena. Sex refers to the geneticallydetermined, physiological differences between males and


females that relate directly to their respective roles in biologicalreproduction. Gender refers to the socially defined, learned behav-iors that are considered appropriate for individuals of a particu-lar sex. Sex is universal in the sense that no matter where you go,all females have the same genitalia and potentially the sameroles in biological reproduction (they gestate and lactate), whilemales have a distinctive set of genitalia and their own role in bio-logical reproduction (they impregnate). In contrast, while allhuman societies have gender systems, the specific personalitiesand behaviors that are considered appropriately masculine orfeminine vary from one group to the next. For example, in somesocieties making pottery is considered “women’s work,” while inothers it is “men’s work.” Similarly, in some societies it is con-sidered feminine to be passionate and headstrong and masculineto be calm and rational, while in others the near opposite holdstrue.

3. A few of the pioneering studies are published in Cheryl Claassen,ed., Exploring Gender through Archaeology (Madison, WI: PrehistoryPress, 1992); Joan Gero and Margaret Conkey, eds., EngenderingArchaeology: Women and Prehistory (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1991);and Dale Walde and Noreen Willows, eds., The Archaeology ofGender: Proceedings of the 22nd Annual Chacmool Conference(Calgary: Archaeological Association of the University of Calgary,1991).

4. Elizabeth J. W. Barber, Prehistoric Textiles: The Development of Clothin the Neolithic and Bronze Ages (Princeton, NJ: PrincetonUniversity Press, 1991), p. 286.

5. Sarah M. Nelson, “Diversity of the Upper Paleolithic ‘Venus’Figurines and Archeological Mythology,” in Sarah M. Nelson andAlice B. Kehoe, eds., Powers of Observation: Alternative Views inArcheology (Washington, DC: American AnthropologicalAssociation, 1990), pp. 11–22.

6. Many of the major conclusions of the UMARP work have beenpublished in Cathy Costin, From Chiefdom to Empire State: CeramicEconomy among the Prehispanic Wanka of Highland Peru (Ph.D. diss.,University of California, Los Angeles; Ann Arbor: UniversityMicrofilms, 1986); Terence D’Altroy, Provincial Power in the InkaEmpire (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992);Timothy Earle, Terence D’Altroy, Christine Hastorf, CatherineLeBlanc, Cathy Costin, Glenn Russell, and Elsie Sandefur,Archaeological Field Research in the Upper Mantaro Peru, 1982–1983:Investigations of Inka Expansion and Exchange (Los Angeles: Instituteof Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles, 1987);Christine Hastorf, Agriculture and the Onset of Political Inequalitybefore the Inka (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993);


Catherine LeBlanc, Late Prehispanic Huanca Settlement Patterns inthe Yanamarca Valley, Peru (Ph.D. diss., University of California,Los Angeles; Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1981); and GlennRussell, The Impact of Inka Policy on the Domestic Economy of theWanka, Peru: Stone Tool Production and Use (Ph.D. diss., Universityof California, Los Angeles; Ann Arbor: University Microfilms,1987).

7. LeBlanc, Late Prehispanic Huanca Settlement Patterns in theYanamarca Valley, Peru, pp. 349–352.

8. Ibid., pp. 339–371.9. Cathy L. Costin and Timothy Earle, “Status Distinction and

Legitimation of Power as Reflected in Changing Patterns ofConsumption in Late Prehispanic Peru,” American Antiquity 54(1989): 691–714.

10. Prior to the Inka conquest, the Wanka built exclusively roundhouses. Inka architecture, in contrast, is characterized by rectangu-lar buildings with trapezoidal niches, windows, and doorways. Inthe Wanka III period, these Inka architectural canons were selec-tively used by the Wanka, but only in elite houses.

11. Bruce Owen and Marilyn Norconk, “Analysis of the HumanBurials, 1977–1983 Field Seasons: Demographic Profiles andBurial Practices,” Appendix 1 in Earle et al., Archaeological FieldResearch in the Upper Mantaro Peru, 1982–1983, pp. 107–123;Marilyn Norconk “Analysis of the UMARP Burials, 1983 FieldSeason: Paleopathology Report,” Appendix 2 in Earle et al.,Archaeological Field Research in the Upper Mantaro Peru, 1982–1983,pp. 124–133.

12. According to the documentary sources, the state supplied thefiber while women theoretically supplied only their labor. Myresearch suggests women probably supplied their own tools. Thefiber likely came from state-controlled cotton fields and camelidherds.

13. There is some discussion as to how exclusively “feminine” clothproduction was. Some argue that all women produced domesti-cally while some men were specialists; others argue that men andwomen made different things and/or used different types oflooms. Two points are relatively clear. First, spinning and weav-ing were such labor intensive activities, and demand for cloth wasso high, that it is likely that all “idle” hands were recruited to helpwith these never-ending tasks. Second, despite the fact that thereality was that at least some boys and/or adult men spun threadand wove cloth, these activities were viewed as archetypal femi-nine roles.


14. Juan Polo de Ondegardo, “Informe…al licenciado Brivesca deMuñatones 1561,” Revista Histórica 13 (1940): 141.

15. John V. Murra, “Cloth and Its Functions in the Inca State,”American Anthropologist 64 (1962): 710–728.

16. We learn from ethnographic literature that feasting is a strategicpolitical activity in ranked societies. During these “social” events,status differences are marked and reinforced, political alliancesare forged, the allocation of resources is negotiated, and decisionsabout marriages, warfare, and other events are made.

17. Christine Hastorf, “Gender, Space, and Food in Prehistory,” inJoan Gero and Margaret Conkey, eds., Engendering Archaeology:Women and Prehistory (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1991), pp. 148–152.

18. John Rowe, “Standardization in Inca Tapestry Tunics,” in AnnRowe, ed., The Junius Bird Pre-Columbian Textile Conference(Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1979), pp. 239–264.

19. Irene Silverblatt, Moon, Sun, and Witches: Gender Ideologies and Classin Inca and Colonial Peru (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,1987).

SUGGESTED READINGS

Barber, Elizabeth J. W. Women’s Work: The First 20,000 Years. NewYork: Norton, 1994. Good discussion of women and weaving inthe Old World.

Costin, Cathy. “Textiles, Women, and Political Economy in LatePrehispanic Peru.” Research in Economic Anthropology 14 (1993):3–28. This article discusses the research presented in this essay ingreater detail.

Ehrenberg, Margaret. Women in Prehistory. Norman, OK: University ofOklahoma Press, 1989. This text provides a good introduction tothe study of women in prehistory. The substantive discussionfocuses primarily on the Old World.

Gero, Joan, and Margaret Conkey, eds. Engendering Archaeology:Women and Prehistory. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1991. This collec-tion of essays offers a balanced overview of archaeologicalapproaches to gender.

Patterson, Thomas. The Inca Empire: The Formation and Disintegration ofa Pre-Capitalist State. New York: Berg, 1991. This discussion of theInka focuses on social, economic, and political relationships withinthe empire.


Silverblatt, Irene. Moon, Sun, and Witches: Gender Ideologies and Class inInca and Colonial Peru. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,1987. The best general discussion of gender in the Inka empire,based entirely on documentary sources.


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