Tiwanaku and Wari
Two Andean states organise the high plateau before the Inca.
- When
- —
- Duration
- 500 years
- Known to
- ± 50 years
- Era
- Post-Classical, Holocene
Tiwanaku near Lake Titicaca builds monumental stone architecture with joints cut to a precision that later fascinated visitors, and sustains agriculture at 3,800 metres using raised fields whose water channels buffer frost. Wari to the north builds planned administrative centres and road networks. Both collapse around 1000 CE amid prolonged drought, and much of what the Inca later assemble — terracing, road systems, khipu record-keeping — draws on their example.