The Incas Research Paper

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Hiram Bingham, the American explorer who found the ruins of Machu Picchu in 1911, wrote:
To the Incas the art of agriculture was of supreme interest. They carried it to a remarkable extreme, attaching more importance to it than we do to-day. They not only developed many different plants for food and medicinal purposes, but they understood thoroughly the cultivation of the soil, the art of proper drainage, correct methods of irrigation, and soil conservation by means of terraces constructed at great expense. Most of the agricultural fields in the Peruvian Andes are not natural. The soil has been assembled, put in place artificially, and still remains fertile after centuries of use.
The Incas learned the importance of fertilizers to keep the …show more content…
It is harvested in April, the stalks are dried and placed on a large blanket laid on the ground as a threshing floor. The blanket serves to prevent the small greyish seeds from escaping when the flail is applied.
Another unfamiliar food plant, also a species of pig weed, is called quinoa. Growing readily on the slopes of the high Andes at an elevation as great as most of our Rocky Mountains it manages to attain a height of three or four feet and produces abundant crops. The seeds are cooked like a cereal and are very palatable.
At lower elevations in the Andes the Incas developed another series of root crops, most of which are still unfamiliar to us, but one, the sweet potato, has achieved world-wide popularity. In addition to discovering and developing useful food plants, the Incas also were the first to learn the advantages of certain medicinal herbs, particularly quinine, long known as a specific in the cure of malaria. They also discovered the specific effects of cocaine, which is extracted from coca leaves, but only allowed it to be used by those engaged in such strenuous activities as the marathons of their post runners. Judging by the "medicines" sold by the Indian "druggists" who display their wares in the market places of the mountain towns, the ancient remedies included such minerals as sulphur, such vegetables as the seeds, roots, and dried leaves of tropical jungle plants, and such animals as
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