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posted by martyb on Saturday May 27 2017, @01:36AM   Printer-friendly
from the succeeded-by-Madame-Thérèse-Defarge dept.

Animal-hair cords dating to the late 1700s contain a writing system that might generate insights into how the Inca communicated, a new study suggests.

Researchers have long wondered whether some twisted and knotted cords from the Inca Empire, which ran from 1400 to 1532, represent a kind of writing about events and people. Many scholars suspect that these textile artifacts, known as khipus, mainly recorded decimal numbers in an accounting system. Yet Spanish colonial documents say that some Inca khipus contained messages that runners carried to various destinations. 

Now a new twist in this knotty mystery comes from two late 18th century khipus stored in a wooden box at San Juan de Collata, a Peruvian village located high in the Andes Mountains. A total of 95 cord combinations of different colors, animal fibers and ply directions, identified among hundreds of hanging cords on these khipus, signify specific syllables, reports Sabine Hyland. Hyland, a social anthropologist at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, describes the khipus online April 19 in Current Anthropology.

Her findings support a story told by Collata villagers that the khipus are sacred writings of two local chiefs concerning a late 18th century rebellion against Spanish authorities.

The Collata khipus display intriguing similarities to Inca khipus, including hanging cords with nearly the same proportions of two basic ply directions, Hyland says. A better understanding of Central Andean khipus from the 1700s through the 1900s will permit a reevaluation of the earlier Inca twisted cords, she suggests.

Messages hidden in plain sight? Or should that be "plaid" site?


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  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:49AM (7 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:49AM (#516260) Journal

    You're right - the prohibition of maple syrup needs to be repealed!

    More seriously, the wall is meant to stop the steady invasion of foreign people who are unwanted in this country, as well as to stop the illicit trade in drugs. We aren't "required" by anything to accept the flood of people coming into this country. And, don't even bother with "But, we're a nation of immigrants!" At no time in history did our laws permit people to enter this nation at will, without any regard for the laws in place.

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:57AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:57AM (#516266)

    Why don't you give H1B visas to Mexicans and use their indentured labor to make Bozo the Bezos even richer?

    • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:59AM (1 child)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:59AM (#516268) Journal

      Uhhhh - when have I ever argued in favor of H1B? Or, any other moronic program designed to undercut the American working people? I've a better idea: you should take entire sheaths of H1B forms, and deposit them someplace like Uranus, so that no one can find them, or use them.

      • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 27 2017, @04:14AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 27 2017, @04:14AM (#516295)

        Uhhhh - when have I ever argued in favor of H1B?

        Well... could you, please?
        For a change, if nothing else - the same droning become tiresome after some time.

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by aristarchus on Saturday May 27 2017, @10:07AM (3 children)

    by aristarchus (2645) on Saturday May 27 2017, @10:07AM (#516357) Journal

    At no time in history did our laws permit people to enter this nation at will, without any regard for the laws in place.

    You are making stuff up again! *citation(s) needed*

    Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882 which targeted a single ethnic group by specifically limiting further Chinese immigration. Chinese had immigrated to the Western United States as a result of unsettled conditions in China, the availability of jobs working on railroads, and the Gold Rush that was going on at that time in California. The expression "Yellow Peril" became popular at this time.

    The act excluded Chinese laborers from immigrating to the United States for ten years and was the first immigration law passed by Congress.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_laws_concerning_immigration_and_naturalization_in_the_United_States

    You can read, Runaway? First Immigration law, 1882. You may be confusing immigration laws with Naturalization laws, a different matter, and one you also have your caput in rectum about. So can we get back to the Inca knot records?

    • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:04PM (2 children)

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Saturday May 27 2017, @02:04PM (#516408) Journal

      The United States Constitution was adopted on September 17, 1787. Article I, section 8, clause 4 of the Constitution expressly gives the United States Congress the power to establish a uniform rule of naturalization.[1]

      Pursuant to this power, Congress in 1790 passed the first naturalization law for the United States, the Naturalization Act of 1790. The law enabled those who had resided in the country for two years and had kept their current state of residence for a year to apply for citizenship. However it restricted naturalization to "free white persons" of "good moral character".

      The Naturalization Act of 1795 increased the residency requirement to five years residence and added a requirement to give a three years notice of intention to apply for citizenship, and the Naturalization Act of 1798 further increased the residency requirement to 14 years and required five years notice of intent to apply for citizenship.
      _________________

      Aristarchus, you poor boob, you should have translated that to Greek before you jumped on it. The first paragraph of your own link puts the lie to your statement. Yeah, "naturalization" - you can't be a citizen unless you're naturalized, right? Despite the last part of the last sentence. Oh, wait, you thought that wikipedia is an authoritative source? Don't we all know better than that?

      Want some more interesting stuff on immigration?
      http://www.shmoop.com/early-american-immigration/benjamin-franklin.html [shmoop.com]

      http://www.scpr.org/blogs/multiamerican/2010/09/02/7846/quote-of-the-moment-circa-1751-a-founding-father-o/ [scpr.org]

      First, it was the Germans, then it was the Greeks, then the Poles, now it's EVERYONE!

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Saturday May 27 2017, @06:22PM (1 child)

        by aristarchus (2645) on Saturday May 27 2017, @06:22PM (#516494) Journal

        Aristarchus, you poor boob, you should have translated that to Greek before you jumped on it.

        Notice that I am not the one who cannot spell "too"!

        The first paragraph of your own link puts the lie to your statement. Yeah, "naturalization" - you can't be a citizen unless you're naturalized, right?

        Runaway, do try and keep up. Naturalization is becoming a citizen. But that is not what you said, you said America has never allow free immigration, and my response is that this, as per usual, if just plain false. Wrong. Not a fact. People could freely immigrate to the United states from it's founding unit the 1882 act. There were several laws concerning naturalization, but these did not prevent free immigration. And after 1882, almost all legislation restricting immigration were quite explicitly racist. The quota system for Eastern Europeans, like Polacks, was extremely so. And gradually they have all been determined to be unconstitutional. And the latest reform on these matters has been held up by the Republicans and useful yokels like yourself for over a decade.

        Despite the last part of the last sentence.

        Wot? You read the whole sentence? Good job, Runaway!

        Oh, wait, you thought that wikipedia is an authoritative source? Don't we all know better than that?

        One thing philosophers excel at is critical assessment of sources. Yes, it is Wikipedia, but it does seem to be more authoritative than your Fox-fueled, racist, Trump-supporting xenophobic falsehoods about American history. Good enough for our purposes here, and actually on topic, unlike your usual dodgy diversionary links.