488 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1918. 



implement of agriculture. Though the early accounts show that 

 llamas were employed extensively, as beasts of burden the ancient 

 Peruvians appear to have devised no means of using these animals 

 for draft purposes or to assist in the cultivation of the soil. The 

 farming of the mountain grasslands was done by human labor, 

 facilitated by a peculiar implement for breaking the sod. 



The Peruvian foot plow, in the Quichua language called taclla 

 or chaquitaclla, consists of a rather stout wooden handle, between 

 5 and 6 feet long, shod in modern times with an iron point about 3 

 inches wide and two or three times as long. On the left side just 

 above the iron point, is a foot rest, bound to the handle by leathern 

 thongs. A few inches farther up is another rest attached in the 

 same way, projecting forward. The second rest is for the left 

 hand, which thus assists the foot in applying the weight of the 

 body to the pushing of the implement into the soil. Middendorff's 

 idea of the taclla being worked with both feet may have been sug- 

 gested by the presence of the two projecting pieces, but one foot 

 would be needed on the ground. 



Other names for native Peruvian plows are arma and yapwna, 

 recorded by Holguin and Middendorff, respectively. The verb to 

 plow is yapuy or yapuni, and yapuh is a plowman. In the Aymara 

 language, spoken in the high tablelands around Lake Titicaca, yapa 

 is a field or farm, corresponding to chacra in Quichua. Among the 

 Quichua words that may be related to taclla are tacllamaqui, the 

 palm of the hand, and tacllanl, meaning to slap or to knead, which 

 might refer to plowing. Another verb, takyani, meaning to fix or 

 make firm, might allude to the lashing on of the rests for the foot 

 and the hand. Holguin gives surwna as the name of the foot rest 

 of the taclla. The word chaquilpa is defined as a part of a chaqui- 

 taclla, and Jiuisu as a stick that is lashed to a plow. 



The plowmen do not work alone, but two together, so that their 

 tacllas enter the soil only a few inches apart, under the same piece 

 of sod, which is then pried up. A boy or woman kneels in front of 

 each team of plowmen to turn the sods as fast as they are loosened. 

 There is also a special word, raeirc, defined by Holguin as the boy 

 who turns the sod in plowing. Effort is required in driving the 

 taclla into the ground, as well as in prying up the sod. In the 

 rarified atmosphere of the high altitudes plowing with the taclla 

 is very strenuous exercise. The men are soon out of breath, and the 

 work has to be done in short "heats." While the operation might 

 be compared to spading, there are three notable differences — the way 

 of handling the tool, the tearing of the sod, instead of cutting it, 

 and the turning of the sod by hand instead of lifting and reversing 

 it with the spade. The taclla is like a narrow spade, or spud, but 



