The Inca Empire, or Inka Empire (Quechua: Tawantinsuyu), was the largest empire in the pre-Columbian American Continent.
The administrative, political and military center of the empire was located in Cusco in modern-day Peru.
The Inca civilization arose from the highlands of Peru sometime in the early 13th century.
From 1438 to 1533, the Incas used a variety of methods, from conquest to peaceful assimilation, to incorporate a large portion of western South America, centered on the Andean mountain ranges, including large parts of modern Ecuador, Peru, western and south central Bolivia, northwest Argentina, north and north-central Chile, and southern Colombia into a state comparable to the historical empires of the Old World.
The empire ended in 1533 with the arrival of the European Spaniards, who conquered it.
