Inca
Americannoun
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Incas
plural
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a member of any of the dominant groups of South American Indian peoples who established an empire in Peru prior to the Spanish conquest.
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a ruler or member of the royal family in the Incan empire.
noun
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a member of a South American Indian people whose great empire centred on Peru lasted from about 1100 ad to the Spanish conquest in the early 1530s and is famed for its complex culture
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the ruler or king of this empire or any member of his family
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the language of the Incas See also Quechua
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of Inca
1585–95; < Spanish < Quechua inka ruler of the Inca state
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
An Australian man has died after falling down a ravine while walking on the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu in Peru, local authorities have said.
From BBC ● May 22, 2026
“Crypto use in Venezuela will persist and likely expand in the short term,” said Adam Zarazinski, chief executive officer of the crypto-intelligence firm Inca Digital.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 10, 2026
Fifteen people were injured when two trains crashed head-on Tuesday near the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu, Peru's top tourist attraction, police and train operators said.
From Barron's ● Dec. 30, 2025
Two trains collided on the single track leading to the ancient Inca town on Tuesday, according to a statement from the local government.
From BBC ● Dec. 30, 2025
The months until his death gave Pizarro time to dispatch exploring parties unmolested to other parts of the Inca Empire, and to send for reinforcements from Panama.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
In this middle area, too, a landscape and the sea, also associated with Incan gods, are visible above a stone wall much like those the Incas built.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 17, 2026
"Guano was a highly sought-after resource the Incas would have wanted access to, playing an important role in the diplomatic arrangements between the Inca and the Chincha communities," Dr. Bongers said.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 7, 2026
“There’s a mystical weirdness about the place that is so cool,” Glasnow said of the ancient stone-walled structures of the Lost City of the Incas.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 27, 2024
From there the Princess will head to Qoricancha, or “The Golden Temple” in Quechua language, considered the most important - and most sacred - temple by the Incas.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 3, 2023
When we in the United States think of the most populous New World societies existing in 1492, only those of the Aztecs and the Incas tend to come to our minds.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
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.
