ABSTRACT
Historically, most evidence on the matter has been gathered in the Old World rather than the New, and has given rise to major debates on the role of pastoralism within the 'Neolithic Revolution', in particular its relation to hunting economy. Fundamental to the present enquiry into pastoralism and the New World is the existence of evidence of not just an archaeological or anthropological order. Privileging native texts as evidence and respecting their New World context, this enquiry started by suggesting Tahuantinsuyu as a valuable term of reference by which to assess the ideology, no less than the economics, of pastoralism. From this base, pastoralism was shown to have permeated principal aspects of Inca ideology. It patently shaped models of political control and authority, along with their extension into the divine; it modified traditional codes of interaction between humans and animals, such as the domestic contract of American world-age cosmogony; and it inspired a gamut of literary pastoralism.
