umstances over
which I had no control prevented my making a thorough study of the
possibilities of such a theory. It remains for some fortunate future
investigator to determine who were the inhabitants of Piquillacta,
how they secured their water supply, and why the city was abandoned.

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FIGURE

Sacsahuaman: Detail of Lower Terrace Wall
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FIGURE

Ruins of the Aqueduct of Rumiccolca
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Until then I suggest as a possible working hypothesis that we have at
Piquillacta the remains of a pre-Inca city; that its chiefs and people
cultivated the Lucre Basin and its tributaries; that as a community
they were a separate political entity from the people of Cuzco;
that the ruler of the Cuzco people, perhaps an Inca, finally became
sufficiently powerful to conquer the people of the Lucre Basin, and
removed the tribes which had occupied Piquillacta to a distant part of
his domain, a system of colonization well known in the history of the
Incas; that, after the people who had built and lived in Piquillacta
departed, no subsequent dwellers in this region cared to reoccupy the
site, and its aqueduct fell into decay. It is easy to believe that
at first such a site would have been considered unlucky. Its houses,
unfamiliar and unfashionable in design, would have been considered not
desirable. Their high walls might have been used for a reconstructed
city had there been plenty of water available. In any case, the ruins
of the Lucre Basin offer a most fascinating problem.

In the Oropesa Basin the most important ruins are those of Tipon,
a pleasant, well-watered valley several hundred feet above the
village of Quispicanchi. They include carefully constructed houses
of characteristic Inca construction, containing many symmetrically
arranged niches with stone lintels. The walls of most of the houses
are of rough stones laid in clay. Tipon was probably the residence
of the principal chief of the Oropesa Basin. It commands a pleasant
view of the village and of the hills to the south, which to-day
are covered with fields of wheat and barley. At Tipon there is a
nicely constructed fountain of cut stone. Some of the terraces are
extremely well built, with roughly squared blocks fitting tightly
together. Access from one terrace to another was obtained by steps made
each of a single bonder projecting from the face of the terrace. Few
better constructed terrace walls are to be seen anywhere. The terraces
ar