Inca Civilization
Article

The Hatun Runa and Commoner Life in the Inca Empire

The hatun runa — literally “the great people” or simply “the people” — were the free commoners of the Inca Empire, comprising perhaps 80 to 90 percent of the population of the Tawantinsuyu at the time of the Spanish conquest in 1532. The hatun runa lived in ayllu communities, worked land allocated to them by the state, served periodic labor obligations under the mit’a system, produced textiles and food for state stores, and participated in the dense ritual life of the Andean year. They were not, in the legal sense, slaves: they owned use rights to land, married freely within the rules of the ayllu, and could rise in status by military service. A hatun runa who had distinguished himself in the army of the Sapa Inca could be raised to the rank of a minor nobleman, granted an estate, and given a wife from the aclla wasi — a privilege that the chronicler Garcilaso de la Vega identified as the principal reward for valor. The hatun runa were nonetheless subject to a heavy burden of state labor and tribute, and the quality of their material life, by European standards, was modest.

Status and rights in the Inca social hierarchy

The hatun runa occupied a defined position in the Inca social hierarchy, legally distinct from the yanakuna (retainers of the state and of the royal panacas) and from the curacas (hereditary provincial lords). They were free persons in the sense that they could not be bought or sold, that they could own personal property, and that they could marry and divorce within the rules of the ayllu. They owned use rights to land, allocated to their household by the ayllu on a roughly equal per-household basis, and they could transmit those use rights to their children. They were subject, however, to a substantial burden of state obligation, and the late Inca period, in particular, saw a marked intensification of the mit’a labor system.

A hatun runa household’s principal obligations to the state were of three kinds. First, the mit’a labor obligation: a fixed number of days each year, varying by region but typically amounting to perhaps one-third of a household’s working time, in which household members were required to work for the state on roads, terraces, qollqas, and mines. Second, the tribute in kind obligation: a fixed quota of textiles, food, and other commodities that the household was required to deliver to the state stores each year. Third, the minka obligation: a duty to participate in communal labor for the ayllu, in addition to the mit’a owed to the state. The chronicler Cieza de León recorded that a typical hatun runa household in the Chinchaysuyu might owe the state between 60 and 90 days of mit’a labor per year, plus a fixed quota of 4 to 6 cumbi tunics and 1 to 2 q’epi (woven bags) of food per household.

The hatun runa had a number of rights in return. The state guaranteed the use of their land, the protection of the imperial army, the infrastructure of roads and qollqas that made the agricultural system viable, and a system of famine relief by which food was distributed from state stores in years of bad harvest. The state also provided a system of justice: the curaca of the local ayllu held a court in which disputes between commoners were heard, and appeals could be carried to the provincial governor and ultimately to the Sapa Inca himself. A hatun runa who had been wrongly convicted had, in principle, the right to appeal directly to the Sapa Inca, and the chronicler Murúa recorded several cases in which the Sapa Inca personally reversed the decisions of provincial courts.

The household and the life cycle

The hatun runa household was, in its ideal form, an extended family — the tiana — containing a patriarch, his wife or wives, their unmarried children, and as many married sons and their wives as could be supported by the family’s lands. The household occupied a stone-and-adobe house of one or two rooms, with a low thatched roof, an adjacent open-air kitchen with a tulpa (low hearth), and a series of small storerooms (trojes) in which the household’s quota of chuño, maize, and quinoa was kept. A typical highland household stored perhaps 200 to 400 kilograms of chuño and 100 kilograms of maize at any one time, together with smaller quantities of dried meat, salt, and ají.

The life cycle of the hatun runa was regulated by the ayllu. Children of both sexes began work in the household at an early age: boys tended llamas and alpacas from the age of 5 or 6 and were initiated into agricultural work at 10 or 12; girls helped with food preparation and textile production from an early age and learned to weave on the backstrap loom by 8 or 10. Boys and girls were betrothed at the age of 18 to 20, with the formal marriage taking place shortly thereafter; the principal exception was the mit’a of the army, which could delay marriage for several years. A man was considered to be in the prime of life from about 25 to 50, and women from about 20 to 40; the chronicler Betanzos recorded that this range corresponded to the years at which an Andean was expected to perform the heaviest labor for the ayllu and the state.

Old age was respected in the ayllu. The senior members of the household held authority over the family’s labor, marriage arrangements, and ritual life, and they were responsible for the regular offering of chicha and coca to the family’s mallkis (mummified ancestors). When a household head died, the household’s use rights to land passed to his eldest son, and the household’s ritually important objects — the t’oqapu textile, the family mallki, the bundle of quipus recording the family’s history — were transmitted to the heir. The colonial visitas of 1558–1570 record many cases in which elderly hatun runa were granted reduced labor obligations and additional rations from the state stores as a mark of respect.

Daily diet, dress, and material life

The daily diet of the hatun runa was based on chuño — freeze-dried potatoes that could be stored for years without spoiling — and on a handful of steamed or boiled root vegetables, supplemented by maize at festival time and by the meat of camelids, cuy (guinea pig), and freshwater fish. The chronicler Cieza de León recorded that a typical highland hatun runa consumed between 1.5 and 2.5 kilograms of chuño per day, together with smaller quantities of oca (Oxalis tuberosa), olluco (Ullucus tuberosus), and quinoa. Meat was eaten rarely — perhaps once a week in the best of times — and the principal sources of animal protein were the cuy, which was raised in the household, and the meat of llamas and alpacas, which was distributed from state stores on festival occasions.

Dress was plain and uniform. The hatun runa wore a q’ara uncu — a plain brown or black tunic of llama wool, reaching to the knees — together with a small lliclla (mantle) and a chuku (woolen cap). The state regulated the patterns of commoner dress with some strictness, and the unauthorized use of a finer cloth or of a color reserved for the nobility was a serious offense. The hatun runa’s principal possessions, beyond the house and its contents, were his clothing, his tools, and his share of the household’s llama and alpaca herd. The colonial visitas record hatun runa households owning between 5 and 30 head of camelids, together with small quantities of gold or silver jewelry (typically a single tupu pin and a pair of small earrings), and the tools of agricultural labor — the chakitaqlla (footplow), the harvest knife, and the digging stick.

Hatun runa in the political and ritual life of the empire

The hatun runa were not marginal to the political and ritual life of the empire: they were the principal actors in the local rituals of the ayllu and the participants in the larger festivals of the imperial calendar. Every ayllu held a series of raymi (festivals) at fixed points in the agricultural year — the Qhapaq Raymi in the months before the solstice, the Inti Raymi at the winter solstice, the Pachamama Raymi in August, the Situa Raymi in September — at which the hatun runa performed the dances, sang the songs, and consumed the food and drink that bound the community to its ancestors and to the state. The chronicler Cobo recorded that the principal local festivals of the ayllu involved a complete suspension of agricultural work for several days, during which the entire community feasted, danced, and made offerings to the huacas.

A hatun runa could rise in the social system by several routes. Military service was the most important: a man who had distinguished himself in the army of the Sapa Inca could be raised to the rank of a minor nobleman, granted an estate, and given a wife from the aclla wasi. Service as a quipucamayoc (keeper of the quipus) was another route to advancement, as was service as a camayoc (ritual specialist) in the local ayllu. The colonial visitas of 1558–1570 record many cases in which the children of commoners had risen to positions of considerable authority within the local ayllu and the provincial administration, and the chronicler Murúa recorded that the Sapa Inca was accustomed to choose senior officials from among the hatun runa who had distinguished themselves in service.