Inca ushnus: landscape, site and symbol in the Andes

本项目研究印加帝国(公元1400-1532年)如何应对挑战，侵占和修改安第斯山脉的地形，以提高其生产能力和政治实力，从而创建美洲最大的原住民国家。为了解决安第斯山脉景观、遗址和象征之间的关系，我们建议对一种特定的印加建筑结构进行跨学科研究，这种建筑被称为ushnu。Ushnu是一个盖丘亚语术语，包含了为印加国王和特权印加人保留的受限、神圣的空间的概念。这一概念在一系列形式中得到了具体的表达，从位于区域行政中心中心广场的显眼的石面阶梯形金字塔和平台，到放置在景观中显著可见点的较小建筑。当印加(或作为他的代表的省级领主)和他的随从站在这个讲台上时，他肯定了印加国的至高无上及其统治的神圣权力。这些平台被用作公共舞台，用来举行仪式，宣布在农历内种植和收获的时间，使用著名的物品，如qeros(用于烤面包和烧酒的金属、陶器和木材制成的饮用器)。它们还被用于再分配仪式，以示公众的慷慨，将人民与他们的尺子捆绑在一起，偶尔还会用来供奉一套微型陶器和金属雕像。因此，ushnus被赋予了深远的象征意义，并被用作行政控制的实用工具，以规范日常生活，并确立印加对臣民、人口和资源的至高无上地位。作为印加政治和神圣地理中的焦点元素，它们在景观中的分布为理解印加人在维护控制权和将新领土纳入其迅速扩张的帝国方面的非凡有效性提供了关键。我们的目标是了解其建造背后的实际和象征性原则，它们在景观中的位置和功能的基本原理，以及在它们身上发生的活动和相关的文物组合。这项研究将集中在维尔卡斯瓦曼周围的腹地，那里曾经是秘鲁中央高地印加帝国的地理中心。在这里，印加皇家公路系统(Capac Nan)中最令人印象深刻和保存最完好的ushnus之一标志着连接首都库斯科和太平洋海岸的东西主干道和连接不断扩大的北部边境和印加心脏地带的伟大南北公路之间的联系。在与秘鲁合作者合作开展的一项为期3年的计划中(2007年1月至2009年12月)，我们将沿着高速公路的两段和邻近腹地对选定的ushnus进行调查、测绘、土壤分析和挖掘。我们会根据土地集水区的资源，例如农业潜力、泉水、灌溉设施，以及其他文化特色，包括主干道和坦波(中转站)、储存设施，以及附属道路和小径，评估选址地点。与当地社区的人种学工作和民族史研究将提供对ushnus被和被使用和理解的方式的关键见解。我们将特别关注ushnu视棚和站点间的可见性，以揭示印加认知的各个方面，以及与传统西方规则之外的风景的关系。田野工作和实验室分析将与对大英博物馆安第斯藏品的研究并行进行，共同有助于以创新的方式联系背景和了解印加藏品，最终形成一个致力于安第斯文明和

This project examines how the Inca Empire (c. AD 1400 - 1532) met the challenge of appropriating and modifying the Andean landscape to enhance its productive capacity and political power so as to create the largest native state in the Americas. To address the relationship between landscape, site and symbol in the Andes we propose a trans-disciplinary study of a specific kind of Inca architectural construction known as the ushnu. Ushnu is a Quechua term that encompasses the idea of a restricted, sanctified space reserved for use by the Inca king and Incas-by-privilege. This concept found material expression in a hierarchy of forms ranging from conspicuous, stone-faced stepped pyramids and platforms located in the central plazas of regional administrative centres, to smaller constructions placed at prominent visible points in the landscape. When the Inca (or a provincial lord as his representative) stood on this platform with his retinue, he affirmed the supremacy of the Inca state and its divine authority to rule. The platforms were used as public stages to conduct ceremonies announcing the timing of planting and harvest within the agricultural calendar using prestigious objects such as qeros (drinking vessels made in metal, pottery and wood for toasting and libations). They were also used for redistributive rituals enacted as shows of public generosity to bind the people to their rulers and occasionally to make offerings of sets of miniature pottery vessels and metal figurines. Ushnus were therefore invested with profound symbolic significance and served as pragmatic instruments of administrative control to regulate daily life and assert Inca supremacy over subject populations and resources. As focal elements in Inca political and sacred geography their distribution in the landscape offers a key to understanding how extraordinarily effective the Incas were in asserting control and incorporating new territories into their rapidly expanding empire.Our goal is to understand the practical and symbolic principles underlying their construction, the rationale for their placement and function within the landscape, the activities that took place on them together with their associated artifact assemblages. The study will focus on the hinterland surrounding Vilcashuaman that once lay at the geographical centre of the Inca Empire in the Peruvian Central Highlands. Here, one of the most impressive and best preserved ushnus on the system of Inca Royal Roads (capac nan) marked the nexus between the main East-West road connecting the capital Cusco with the Pacific coast, and the great South-North highway linking the expanding northern frontier with the Inca heartland. In a 3 year programme (Jan 2007 - Dec 2009) to be undertaken in partnership with Peruvian collaborators, we will undertake survey, mapping, soil analysis and excavation of selected ushnus along two stretches of the highway and in the adjacent hinterland. We will assess site locations in relation to site catchment resources such agricultural potential, springs, irrigation, and also to other cultural features including the main arterial highway and tambos (way stations) and storage facilities as well as ancillary roads and paths. Ethnographic work with local communities and ethno-historical research will provide key insights into the ways in which ushnus were and are used and understood. We will be paying particular attention to ushnu view-sheds and inter-site visibility in order to reveal aspects of Inca cognition and relationship to the landscape that lie outside conventional western rules. The fieldwork and laboratory analysis will proceed in parallel with a study of the British Museum's Andean collections and together will contribute to innovative ways to contextualizing and understanding the Inca collections, culminating in a new gallery devoted to Andean civilization an