, cap. 9. - Acosta, lib. 6, cap. 8. - Garcilasso Parte 1, lib.
6, cap. 8.]
Officers were established in each of the districts, who, under
the title of quipucamayus, or "keepers of the quipus," were
required to furnish the government with information on various
important matters. One had charge of the revenues, reported the
quantity of raw material distributed among the laborers, the
quality and quantity of the fabrics made from it, and the amount
of stores, of various kinds, paid into the royal magazines.
Another exhibited the register of births and deaths, the
marriages, the number of those qualified to bear arms, and the
like details in reference to the population of the kingdom.
These returns were annually forwarded to the capital, where they
were submitted to the inspection of officers acquainted with the
art of deciphering these mystic records. The government was thus
provided with a valuable mass of statistical information, and the
skeins of many-colored threads, collected and carefully
preserved, constituted what might be called the national
archives. *5
[Footnote 5: Ondegardo expresses his astonishment at the variety
of objects embraced by these simple records, "hardly credible by
one who had not seen them." "En aquella ciudad se hallaron muchos
viejos oficiales antiguos del Inga, asi de la religion, como del
Govierno, y otra cosa que no pudiera creer sino la viera, que por
hilos y nudos se hallan figuradas las leyes, y estatutos asi de
lo uno como de lo otro, las sucesiones de los Reyes y tiempo que
governaron: y hallose lo que todo esto tenian a su cargo que no
fue poco, y aun tube alguna claridad de los estatutos que en
tiempo de cada uno se havia: puesto.
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