One of the World's Largest Empires
When Europeans arrived at the western shores of South America early in the 16th century, they encountered the empire of the Inkas at its greatest extent. At that time, it was the largest empire in the world, stretching nearly 2,500 miles along the Pacific shore and over the ridge of the Andes - similar to the extent of the Roman Empire at its peak. Its emperor, the Inka, ruled over millions of people of diverse ethnic backgrounds. The empire was tied together by a 10,000 mile network of stone-paved highways, some as wide as 24 feet, paralleling the Pacific coast and criss-crossing the the rugged spine of the Andes. A series of runners, called chasquis, carried information between points at remarkable speed, utilizing quipus, a system of knotted strings, to help them remember the message accurately, as the Inkas had no written language.

An Empire built on Devotion, Food, and Textiles
The Inkas and their predecessors had built extensive terraces over thousands of miles of steep mountainside. These and their hardy, varied crops allowed them to produce enough surplus food to build a vast empire. In a land in which money did not exist and gold (called "tears of the sun") was valued only for its beauty, workers and soldiers were paid in food and textiles.