Tupu and Inca measures
Tupu y medidas incas
- Date
- c. 1450 · confidence low
- Place
- Cusco, Peru
- Credited to
- Inca state (Tawantinsuyu)
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What was discovered
The tupu was the measure of area of the land the State assigned to each family and, according to the chroniclers, also a measure of distance along the roads. Together with other length measures (for example the fathom or rikra), it regulated land distribution, labour turns and quipu records.
Values in metres vary by chronicler and region and are known only from sixteenth-century Spanish sources; no material standards survive. It is an approximate reconstruction.
What it led to
- distribution of land among families and labour turns (mita)
- measurement of distances between tambos on the Qhapaq Ñan
- area records in the quipus