U
UHLE, MAXRecognized as the “father of archaeology” in some of the South American
countries where he worked and lived for more than four decades (1892–
1933), Uhle was born in Dresden in 1856, and died in Loben, now Poland, in
- He was the first to introduce the idea of an Andean chronology, and his
chronological proposals still retain much of their merit. The linchpin of his
chronology is that the presence of Inca material remains is a historical fact.
Uhle was well acquainted with Inca material as early as 1887 when an
important collection from Cuzco arrived at the Royal Ethnological Museum
at Berlin, where he worked.
In 1892 Uhle began a project in Argentina to study the southeastern
extension of the Inca Empire, where he visited and worked at many Inca sites,
as well as in neighboring Bolivia. Inca archaeology and history still remained
important topics in Peru, Chile, and Ecuador. Of special importance are his
excavations at Tomebamba, an important Inca administrative center in
Ecuador.
His critical approach to Inca history was characterized by confronting data
in early Colonial written sources with evidence from excavations. In 1905, he
excavated in several places at and near Cuzco and identified the numerous
sculptured rocks dotting the hills around Sacsahuaman as burial places of
ancestors, related to kin groups (see Panacas), as well as Sun altars,
providing a fairly complex and modern description of huacas (see Religion).
He did not consider so-called intihuatanas (upright, carved stones) to be
astronomical devices. Uhle was very interested in Inca social organization
and its role in the ceque system. When applied to Inca “origins,” his
chronological scheme proved the Incas’ modest origins (i.e., local Killke-style
pottery; see Chronology, Inca) and their use of the Aymara language before
adopting Quechua. At the time, many Peruvian historians criticized his ideas,
but modern scholarship has shown many of them to be correct.
Further Reading