Inca Road System Expanded

1430

Under Pachacuti, the Inca began the vast expansion of their royal road network, eventually exceeding forty thousand kilometers of paved highway traversing the Andes from Colombia to Chile. Tambo way-stations, storehouses, and suspension bridges enabled imperial messages to cross steep cordilleras in days. No contemporary state matched this logistics. Chasqui relay runners could carry messages along these roads at over a hundred and fifty miles per day, faster than any European post.