J. Alden Mason (1885–1967)

I first read this in university as part of my history classes. At the time I skimmed the bits I needed to and tried to fit it into the rest of my reading. This second time round I read it more carefully. It is a very detailed depiction of life in pre-Columbian Peru and the surrounding regions. It concentrates, inevitably, on the Inca empire but does not exclude other peoples who are less famous today. The book describes the environment, culture and craft of the Inca in great detail. But still, there is a great distance between the Inca and the reader. The book did not enable me to understand those people, but perhaps that is expecting too much.… (mehr)