perspective on the subject was through the lens of culture history and it
reflected the influence of Alfred Kroeber and the Boasian anthropological
tradition that characterized the University of California, Berkeley, during
Rowe’s four decades on the faculty there. His undergraduate training at
Brown University in classical archaeology gave him an appreciation of the
potential of the stylistic analysis of ceramics to construct relative
chronologies, and these tools proved to be crucial for his seminal studies of
culture change in the Andes during pre-Inca, Inca, and Colonial times.
Rowe became established as a leading authority on the Incas before he was
thirty years old as the result of his 1944 Harvard monograph, An Introduction
to the Archaeology of Cuzco. This volume offered the first rigorous
description of the Incas as an archeological culture and provided an
introduction to the pre-Inca cultures of the zone, such as the Chanapata
culture. Rowe’s reputation was enhanced by his masterly 1946 synthesis of
Inca culture at the time of the Spanish conquest for the Handbook of South
American Indians. In the decades that followed, Rowe focused on the
archaeology and history of Peru, especially in Cuzco, and his work in the
field on pre-imperial cultures, such as Killke, and his historical studies on the
chronology and organization of Inca kingship and administration, have
shaped our current understanding of these topics in Cuzco and Tahuantinsuyu.
Rowe advocated an inductive approach coupled with meticulous
historiography in the study of Inca and Andean culture history, and because
he considered culture change as pervasive, he prioritized the need for
chronological control. One important aspect in his investigations was the
study of Inca resistance to the Spanish conquest and this was reflected in his
analysis of Colonial wooden drinking vessels (keros), Colonial oil paintings
of Inca royalty, and the nineteenth-century rebellion of Túpac Amaru II.
In addition to over 300 original publications, Rowe also influenced the field
of Andean studies through the training of students in Berkeley and Cuzco.
While at the University of California, Berkeley, he served as the primary
advisor for over 20 PhD students, most specializing in the archaeology and/or
history of the Central Andes. In 1960, Rowe, along with, Dorothy Menzel,
founded the Institute for Andean Studies and its journal Ñawpa Pacha as a
forum to discuss and publish research on Andean archaeology and
ethnohistory.
Further Reading