The Inca people were organized into clans, or groups. Every Inca family was part of a clan, and each clan farmed a piece of land. Families lived in windowless, one-room stone huts with thatched roofs. Home, sweet home, probably didn’t smell so sweet, since families sometimes burned dried animal waste as fuel. Parents and children slept together on animal skins spread on the bare floor. A few wall pegs were the only furnishings.

Boys followed their fathers’ trades. Girls copied their mothers’. Most Inca were farmers. They grew corn, squash, tomatoes, peanuts, cotton, and more than a hundred varieties of potatoes. The potato was the main crop for the Inca. It grew well even at high altitudes on the slopes of the Andes Mountains.

Inca farmers also raised livestock. This included guinea pigs, alpacas, and llamas. The guinea pigs were raised for food. The alpacas were a source of wool. The Inca used llamas for all sorts of things, but especially as pack animals.

The llama is truly an amazing animal. It is a smaller cousin of the camel. A llama stands about four feet high at the shoulder and weighs about 250 pounds. Like its camel cousin, the llama has great strength and endurance. Llamas can carry loads up to 125 pounds for fifteen to twenty miles a day. They will eat just about anything and can go long periods without drinking. Llamas are also gentle animals. But if they are mistreated or overloaded, they will let you know it. A llama may simply sit down and refuse to move. An unhappy llama may hiss and spit to make its point. Llama spit is not just wet and nasty. It can include hard pellets of food, which can cause pain if they hit you.

The Inca used llamas to transport goods. They also used the llama’s wool for cloth, its hide for rugs and coats, its waste for fuel and fertilizer, and its meat for food. When a llama died, the Inca cut the meat into strips and dried it in the sun. They called these strips charqui (/chahr*kee/). This is the source of our own word for dried meat, jerky.

Inca women were skilled weavers. They made clothing from the cotton they grew and from the wool of their llamas and alpacas.