The Architecture

One of the most amazing and mystery that have puzzled the archeology for years is the architecture of the Incas. Their buildings are mostly built from stones, these blocks of stones weigh several tons and they are fit together so tightly that not even a razor blade can fit through them. The Inca stone fitters worked stone with precision unparallel in human history, their architect clearly esteemed functionality above decoration, yet their constructions achieved breathtaking beauty through austerity of line and juxtaposition of masses.

An Inca Wall Made Out of Stone

Materials and Construction Methods

The Inca build their buildings with the rocks, limestone and granite available to them locally. Some of the rocks are found a few kilometers away from the construction site. A good example of the construction site would be the fortress-temple of Ollantaytambo, it is famous for its beautifully fitted great slabs of red porphyry forming a portion of what must have been intended to be its principal temple. But this complex, a work in progress when the conquistadores arrived, was never finished. A number of large cut blocks were abandoned en route to the site and remain today, known as piedras cansadas or "tired stones".

What is still puzzling the archeologist today is that how the Inca cut stone without iron tools, but in all likelihood stone was cut and shaped mainly with stone tools. Bronze or copper tools may also have been used, but would be of limited use with the hard varieties of igneous rock commonly used by the Inca.
 

Inca walls

What the Incas must have considered their very finest stonework is found, naturally, in their most important buildings, their temples. Temple walls are battered (inwards sloping), and constructed of finely hewn ashlars laid in courses that get progressively thinner upwards. This creates a wall with a wonderfully stable and pleasing appearance, and which is, in fact, highly resistant to seismic shaking.



Earthquakes are a common building hazard in the Andean region, and Inka stonework has survived for centuries, even as Spanish colonial structures have collapsed. In fact, the most durable Spanish constructions have been those that incorporated Inka walls. Here original Inca walls have been breached by Spanish colonial doorways; note the inward slope of the lower wall, as opposed to the vertical upper wall of European construction.



Inca doors and windows

Inca doorways, windows, and wall niches are trapezoidal. Some were simple, but elegant, trapezoidal openings. The finest doorways, called "double jamb doorways", have a recessed lip several inches wide inside the outer trapezoid. This inner lip or jamb might have allowed the emplacement of a wooden door to close the opening. That doors were used to close some of the doorways is suggested by a variety of stone loops carved in doorways, apparently for the purpose of tying a door in place. One of the best examples, featuring a stone loop above the doorway, and two stone cylinders fixed in niches on either side, is the principal gateway at Machu Picchu. This gate opens through the outer wall of the city, and clearly was meant to have a defensive door that could be sealed in place with ropes, and braced, no doubt, with heavy beams.

 

Stairs and Walkways

Considering the topography in which they built their cities, it would be astounding if the Inkas were not master stairway builders. Wide stairs marked the main "streets" linking the various levels of their mountain towns, sometimes in long continuous flights made of elongate stones laid flat to form each step. In other instances each step consisted of a series of small stones, shaped and set in a row. And with surprising frequency, the Inka resorted to the more laborious mode of stairway making, hewing steps from the living bedrock. Perhaps the most perfect example of steps carved from bedrock are those leading up towards the "House of the Ņusta" at Machu Picchu: six steps, curving slightly utilizing a bedrock projection that otherwise would have been in the way.