33^ Philip Ainsworth Means, 



m 



Steadfastness to the original type is to be observed; but, never- 

 theless, local sub-types do develop in several cases. Such a one 

 is the Inca style on the islands of Titicaca and Coati in Lake 

 Titicaca. There, though still perfectly definitely related to the 

 usual Cuzco types, the pottery is marked by a tendency to break 

 the decorated surface up into very small geometric areas which 

 are made prominent by the contrasting of dark brown with cream 

 color. This is noticeable in the collections from Titicaca now in 

 the American Museum of Natural History, New York. 



As is usually the case, the textiles, though showing affinities 

 of design with the pottery, are richer in the variety of their 

 colors. The Incas' subjects were as good weavers as any in 

 ^aboriginal Peru. That their art was strong and flourishing at 

 the tirne of the Spanish conquest is proved by the fact that shortly 

 after the conquest there were produced some of the finest speci- 

 mens of Inca tapestry that we have. 



Unlike their predecessors, the people of Tiahuanaco II, the 

 Incas' subjects, though admirable architects, did not decorate 

 their buildings with any great amount of carving. To replace 

 the decoration applied to the walls of huge stones by the carv- 

 ings of Tiahuanaco II type, the subjects of the Incas evolved a 

 new type of architecture. It takes the form of exquisite walls 

 made of reasonably large stones laid in courses of quite aston- 

 ishing accuracy. Often the lowest course would be made of 

 stones of say a foot high; the next course would be slightly 

 lower, and so on to the top. The effect of this technique was a 

 wall of wonderful symmetry and beauty. Such a wall needed no 

 carving to make it sightly. Dr. Bingham gives an excellent pic- 

 ture of this late Inca type of wall.^^ 



This Inca culture, then, was the last of the long series of pre- 

 Columbian Peruvian cultures. With our brief review of the 

 chief features of those cultures thus brought to a conclusion, we 

 will now turn to a detailed analysis of the Plates which accom- 

 pany this paper and which have been chosen with a view to 

 setting forth the more prominent characteristics of the principal 

 culture-types. 



^ Bingham, 1913, p. 488. 



