The Inca Communication System and the Chasqui
The Inca communication system was one of the most efficient pre-industrial networks of information transmission in the world. Built on the foundation of the Qhapaq Ñan, the great Inca road system, and the network of tambos (way stations) at intervals of 20 to 30 kilometers along the road, the system enabled the rapid transmission of messages, news, and orders from the imperial capital of Cusco to the four corners of the empire. The agents of this system were the chasqui (chaski in Quechua), a class of trained relay runners who carried messages and small goods in a continuous chain between tambos, and the records they carried were encoded on the quipu (khipu), a knotted-string device that allowed complex numerical and categorical information to be transmitted in a portable form. The system allowed a message to travel from Cusco to Quito — a five-day run, a distance the chroniclers put at roughly 1,800 kilometers (a straight-line figure; the routed road is closer to 3,500 to 4,000 kilometers in modern reconstructions) — a speed of communication unmatched in the pre-Columbian Americas.
The Chasqui Runners
The chasqui were trained from youth to run long distances at high speed, and they formed a distinct social class within the imperial administration. They were organized in pairs or small groups at each tambo, and they stood ready at all times to receive and transmit messages. When a message arrived at a tambo, the chasqui would receive it from the incoming runner, repeat it back to confirm accuracy, and then set out at speed to the next tambo, where another chasqui would take up the message. The chronicler Pedro Cieza de León, writing in the 1550s, described the operation in terms that emphasize its discipline and efficiency:
At each tambo there are chasqui who are ready to run at all hours, day and night, and they carry the messages with such speed that it seems as if they fly. They run with the message in their hand, and they do not stop until they reach the next tambo, where another chasqui takes the message and runs on.
The chasqui ran barefoot, and they carried a distinctive trumpet (pututu) made of a conch shell or a hollowed-out cow horn, which they sounded to announce their arrival at a tambo. The chronicler Bernabé Cobo recorded that the chasqui also carried a small drum, and that the sound of the pututu and the drum was used to signal the arrival of a message, the approach of a messenger, and (in time of war) the movement of armies.
The chasqui ran in relays of varying length, depending on the terrain. The most common interval was approximately 2 to 3 kilometers. The chasqui were trained to maintain a fast pace over the entire distance, and the chroniclers record that an individual runner was expected to cover a leg of roughly 20 to 30 kilometers in a session, handing the message on to the next runner.
Quipus and the Encoding of Messages
The chasqui typically carried their messages in two forms: as memorized verbal recitations and as quipus. The verbal messages were usually short — a name, a place, an order, or a question — and they could be repeated verbatim from one runner to the next. The quipus, however, allowed more complex messages to be transmitted, including numerical information, lists of names, and categorical data. The chasqui would carry the quipu to the next tambo, where a quipucamayoq — a trained keeper of the quipus — would read the message and pass it on to the next chasqui with a new quipu.
The use of quipus in the communication system allowed the Inca to transmit complex information rapidly and accurately. The Spanish chroniclers record that the chasqui could carry quipus containing census data, tribute lists, military rosters, and other numerical information, and that the quipucamayoqs at each tambo could read and translate the quipus into verbal recitations for the next chasqui. The system was, in effect, a combination of an oral and a written medium, and it allowed the imperial administration to maintain up-to-date records of population, tribute, and military resources across the empire.
The famous sixteenth-century chronicler Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, in his Nueva Corónica y Buen Gobierno (c. 1615), included a detailed illustration of a chasqui running with a quipu in his hand, and described the operation of the communication system in some detail. The chasqui were organized in a hierarchy, with the most senior chasqui at the capital and lower-ranking chasqui at the provincial and district tambos. The system was, in effect, an imperial postal service.
Speed and Reliability
The speed of the Inca communication system was remarkable by the standards of the pre-industrial world. The Spanish chronicler Pedro Pizarro recorded that a message could travel from Cusco to Quito — a five-day run, a distance he put at roughly 1,800 kilometers (again a straight-line figure; the routed road is closer to 3,500 to 4,000 kilometers in modern reconstructions) — implying an average speed of approximately 360 kilometers per day on his reckoning. Garcilaso de la Vega recorded that news from the southern frontier, a distance of more than 3,000 kilometers, could reach Cusco in ten days. The reliability of the system was equally impressive: the chasqui operated continuously, day and night, in all but the worst weather, and the system was not disrupted by political or military disturbances except in cases of outright rebellion.
The Spanish, who encountered the system in the 1530s, were deeply impressed by its efficiency. Pedro Cieza de León described the chasqui system as “the most remarkable thing that I have seen in all the Indies,” and he compared it favorably with the imperial courier services of the Roman Empire. The system was also a major strategic asset: the Spanish, who relied on cavalry and messengers in their own campaigns, recognized the military value of the Inca system and used it themselves in the early colonial period.
Uses of the Communication System
The Inca communication system served several distinct functions. It was used to transmit orders from the Sapa Inca to the provincial governors and from the provincial governors to local officials; to transmit news of events in the provinces — military threats, harvests, demographic changes — to the central administration; to transmit tribute information, including the lists of goods and labor owed to the central administration; to transmit military intelligence in time of war; and to support the Sapa Inca’s travels, including the preparation of tambos, the supply of food, and the assembly of retinue.
Decline of the System
The Inca communication system was dismantled in the years following the Spanish conquest. The Spanish established their own communication system, and the Inca road and tambo system was gradually allowed to deteriorate. The chasqui class lost its function, and the quipucamayoqs were persecuted as repositories of Inca statecraft. By the late sixteenth century, the system was no longer operational. The memory of the chasqui system persisted in the colonial sources and in the cultural memory of the Andean peoples, and the chasqui have become a symbol of the speed and efficiency of Inca communication.
Historical Significance
The Inca communication system, built on the foundation of the Qhapaq Ñan, the tambo network, and the quipu record-keeping technology, was one of the most remarkable information systems of the pre-industrial world. Its speed, reliability, and reach made possible the integration of the Inca Empire, a state of perhaps 12 million people spread across more than 2 million square kilometers of the Andean region. The system remains one of the defining features of the Inca political achievement.