Moche (Civ3)/Civilopedia

As a prevailing culture, the Moche civilization of Peru existed for roughly 600 years (100 to 700 AD). Skilled farmers and fisherman, they raised a wide variety of crops such as maize, peanuts, beans and squash. They hunted deer and seals but also domesticated animals like Muscovy ducks and guinea pigs. Like many other cultures of the region, they had no written language, but they developed a highly sophisticated craftsman society that produced some of the finest ceramics in the world. They were also skilled clay masons and woodworkers, building structures possessing literally millions of individual clay bricks, with each brick personally signed and sealed with the initials of its maker. The Moche were a successful people due in large part to their development of an irrigation and aqueduct system which turned arid coastal soil into choice farmland.