Table of Contents


Preface:

“The KhipuFieldGuide democratizes khipu research, making the wonder of khipus available to everyone.”
Sabine Hyland
“Readers interested in visualizations and computational analyses of OKR data are encouraged to explore the Khipu Field Guide (KFG), a new project by independent researcher Ashok Khosla. In addition to highly-detailed symbolic renderings of over 600 OKR khipus, users can explore interactive graphics accompanying Khosla’s exploratory data analysis. The KFG investigations are a welcome addition to previous computational work on the OKR carried out by Carrie Brezine and Jon Clindaniel.”
Keys to Mathematical Treasure Chests: Andean Khipus – Quantitative Research and Digital Analysis
Manuel Medrano (Harvard University)

“I love The Khipu Field Guide by Ashok Khosla, because it presents diagrams of khipus that are easier to analyze than photos.”
ArchaeoEd - A Podcast about Ancient Civilizations of the Americas - Dr. Edwin Barnhart

UR049 - A “banded” khipu.

UR049

UR049 - A schematic drawing of the same Khipu, arranged to show its primary cord, pendant cords, and subsidiary cords.


Welcome:

Welcome to The Khipu Field Guide - Travel back in time to the Inkan empire of the 14th through 16th century. Explore how the Inkas used cloth to communicate and record commitments. Journey with me, as I work with other khipu scholars, to decipher the enigma behind a knotted mop of camelid yarn.

This site has seven sections.