[antidisestablishment]

"How would one explain the many statements in the Spanish chronicles, both those written by Spaniards and by literate Andeans, who stated quite straightforwardly that the Inca used a base 10 counting system? This system is also attested in a mountain of early colonial documents that describe how the Inca organized their administrative system according to a base 10 counting system."

It couldn't be that the Spaniards might have understood the system incorrectly. After all, we know how interested they were in cultural understanding:

the Inca ruled the largest empire on Earth by the time their last emperor, Atahualpa, was garroted by Spanish conquistadors in 1533.

Brilliant mathematicians those conquistadors! Outsiders bring a fresh perspective to "intractable" issues. Never look to experts for novel ideas.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

It couldn't be that the Spaniards might have understood the system incorrectly. After all, we know how interested they were in cultural understanding:

Only recently (past 10 years IIRC) did we find out that the Maya understood and were using the concept of zero long before the Spanish knew about it. Most records were wiped out, those that remained were unreadable because the Spanish wiped out the readers when they killed off the upper class and religious class. Lots of things were lost forever.

But then the Spanish didn't come for mathematical exchanges or medicinal knowledge. They came for gold and conquest. And they got what they came for.