ayllu
Americannoun
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among the Incas, a kin-based group forming the basic social unit.
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among present-day Indigenous Andean peoples, a community of families sharing land and organized under shared leadership, in some cases recognized as a political or administrative unit.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Example Sentences
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The Inca incorporated the ayllu structure into a governing system based on the decimal system.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2012
The ayllu also stored food and other supplies to distribute among members during hard times.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2012
The ayllu, or extended family group, undertook tasks too big for a single family.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2012
The popular religion was the worship of the founder of each ayllu, or clan, and all joined in adoration of the sun as ancestor of the sovereign Incas.
From Man, Past and Present by Haddon, Alfred Court
His ayllu is Avayni Panaca Ayllu, because the first who had the charge of this ayllu was named Avayni.
From History of the Incas by Markham, Clements R. (Clements Robert), Sir
Inca Rocca brought his son Yahuar-huaccac to Cuzco and nominated him successor to the Incaship, the ayllus and orejones receiving him as such.
From History of the Incas by Markham, Clements R. (Clements Robert), Sir
Forgetting their former treason, he sent the child to its grandfather Soma Inca with forty orejones of the ayllus of Cuzco as his guard.
From History of the Incas by Markham, Clements R. (Clements Robert), Sir
The Incas and their ayllus were, and still are Hanan-cuzco; although afterwards, in the time of Pachacuti, these ayllus were reformed by him.
From History of the Incas by Markham, Clements R. (Clements Robert), Sir
The other Incas and orejones went with Tupac Inca to the House of the Sun and then ordered the twelve captains of the ayllus of the Inca's guard to come.
From History of the Incas by Markham, Clements R. (Clements Robert), Sir
One hundred, representing one of the four ayllus, faced towards each cardinal point and subsequently ran at full speed in its direction, crying “Go forth all evils!”
From The Fundamental Principles of Old and New World Civilizations by Nuttall, Zelia
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
