About this book:

*Corn, Quipu, and City-States* provides an archaeological and cultural survey of Indigenous civilizations across the Americas before 1492. The book challenges the narrative of the Western Hemisphere as a "wilderness," instead detailing a crowded, living landscape defined by sophisticated urban planning, advanced water engineering, and complex social systems. Central to the text are the agricultural revolutions—particularly the cultivation of maize—that supported dense populations through innovative techniques like the *chinampas* of Mexico, Andean terracing, and Amazonian "dark earth" forest management.

The narrative moves through the regional trajectories of major empires and societies, including the Maya, the Mexica (Aztec), and the Inca. It highlights unique intellectual and administrative achievements, such as the Maya’s precise calendrics and glyphic writing, and the Inca’s use of *quipu*—knotted cords—to manage an expansive imperial bureaucracy. Beyond these famous empires, the book examines monumental traditions across the continent, from the earthen mounds of Cahokia in the Mississippi Valley to the desert irrigation systems of the Hohokam and the geoglyphs of the Amazonian lowlands.

The book also explores the internal mechanics of these societies, focusing on trade networks that moved obsidian and Spondylus shells over thousands of miles, the organization of communal labor, and the pervasive role of cosmology in everyday life. By treating architecture and ritual as "arguments in stone," the text illustrates how leaders navigated the challenges of ecology, diplomacy, and warfare to maintain authority and social cohesion.

In its concluding chapters, the book rethinks the concept of "collapse," arguing that the abandonment of cities was often a form of reorganization and resilience rather than a total failure. While the arrival of Europeans brought catastrophic disease and upheaval, the text emphasizes the profound cultural continuities that persist today. It concludes by highlighting the modern revival of Indigenous languages, rights, and technologies, asserting that the pre-Columbian past remains a dynamic, living influence on the contemporary Americas.