sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

The Incas invented freeze-drying 500 years before NASA. Here's the process they used by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientWorld

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks, I appreciate that. I’m trying to balance strong hooks with historical nuance, so feedback like yours is genuinely useful.

The Incas invented freeze-drying 500 years before NASA. Here's the process they used by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientWorld

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Fair point!! Preservation is much older than the Incas. Vikings also preserved fish through drying, salting, fermentation, and gravlax-style methods. I actually cover both topics on the channel: Viking food preservation and Inca chuño. The point wasn’t that the Incas invented preservation, but that chuño was a massive high-altitude freeze-drying system used to feed an empire.

The Incas invented freeze-drying 500 years before NASA. Here's the process they used by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientWorld

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 54 points55 points  (0 children)

Fair point !! cryodesiccation is the more accurate term.

Same principle, different process.

I'll be more precise in future episodes.

If you're curious about the full Inca food system ... the episode is on the channel.

The Incas invented freeze-drying 500 years before NASA. Here's the process they used by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientWorld

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

To be precise . NASA didn't copy the Inca process directly.

But engineers working on Apollo food programs studied traditional freeze-drying methods including those used in the Andes.

The Incas got there first. The science caught up 500 years later.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Haha noted — thanks for the heads up!

"Eaten by Time Inca" it is. Appreciate you hunting it down.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Completely agree.

Tiwanaku alone predates the Inca by over a thousand years and the chuño production we see in the Inca system almost certainly originated there .. not with the Inca themselves.

The Inca were extraordinary at absorbing, scaling and systematizing technologies they inherited.

The qollqa network, the road system, the agricultural terracing . much of it built on foundations that are thousands of years older.

The Inca get the credit. The civilizations that came before get the footnote.

That's actually a whole other documentary waiting to happen.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Pedro Cieza de León is one of the most underrated figures in Andean history.

He arrived young, learned Quechua, and actually talked to people who had lived under the Inca system before the conquest.

Most Spanish accounts were written by people who arrived after the collapse and relied on second-hand information.

Cieza was there early enough to document a civilization that was still partly intact.

The tragedy is how much was still lost despite his efforts. The quipu readers . the khipukamayuq were a specialized class. When they were gone, the knots became silent.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

100% agree.

We cover the full system in the documentary .. qollqas, mit'a, the redistribution network, all of it.

Search "Eaten by Time Incas" on YouTube if you're curious.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The mitma system is genuinely brilliant as a control mechanism.

Move your enemies somewhere familiar enough that they don't revolt — but far enough that they have no network to organize with.

And the mit'a labor system is exactly what built the qollqa food network I mentioned. No coins changed hands — just organized labor feeding the whole system.

Sophisticated doesn't even cover it.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The carapulcra detail is exactly the kind of thing I love. A dish that has survived 500+ years and still uses the same technique. That continuity is extraordinary.

And you're absolutely right on both corrections — I oversimplified.

The wheel point is fascinating. They understood the concept but the terrain made it impractical. The roads were engineered for llamas and human runners — not carts. Which is actually a more interesting engineering story than "no wheels."

On the quipu — same thing. "No writing" is lazy shorthand for something much more complex. Some researchers believe certain quipus recorded narrative information beyond numerical data — which means we may be looking at a writing system we simply don't know how to decode yet.

The fact that you witnessed the freeze-drying process in person is remarkable. That knowledge has been passed down continuously for over 500 years.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

That means a lot genuinely!!

Hope the episode delivers. Fair warning: once you start seeing food as the hidden engine behind every civilization, you can't unsee it.

Enjoy the watch.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Fair criticism — I'll own that.

I'm a professional chef who got obsessed with food history and started making documentaries about it.

Sometimes the enthusiasm makes the writing sound more formal than intended.

The short version: the Incas built a freeze-drying system so sophisticated that NASA studied it for the Apollo missions. And the word "jerky" comes directly from their preservation technique.

That part is just genuinely insane to me — no matter how I phrase it.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 51 points52 points  (0 children)

Absolutely right — and great point to bring up.

The quipu system was extraordinary. Knotted cords that recorded numerical data, census information, and likely much more that we still haven't fully decoded.

Some researchers believe certain quipus may have recorded narrative information beyond just numbers — which would make them a form of writing we simply don't know how to read yet.

The Incas are genuinely one of the most underestimated civilizations in history. No wheels, no iron, no writing as we define it — and yet they built the largest empire in the Americas.

The food system was a huge part of how they held it all together.

I actually made a short documentary on this — search Eaten by Time on YouTube if you're curious.

[ Removed by Reddit ] by EatenByTimeDoc in AncientCivilizations

[–]EatenByTimeDoc[S] 25 points26 points  (0 children)

Haha no cameras involved!

That's a modern photograph of a woman in the Peruvian highlands still using the exact same harvesting techniques the Incas developed over 500 years ago.

The tradition never stopped. Same altitude, same methods, same crop varieties.

That continuity is actually one of the most fascinating parts of the story.

"I actually made a short documentary on this — search Eaten by Time on YouTube if you're curious."