Folklore; Manners and customs; Mythology; Religion
To Garcilasso's mind, Peruvian religion seems to be divided into two
periods--the age before, and the age which followed the accession of
the Incas, and their establishment of sun-worship as the creed of the
State. In the earlier period, the pre-Inca period, he tells us 'an
Indian was not accounted honourable unless he was descended from a
fountain, river, or lake, or even from the sea, or from a wild
animal, such as a bear, lion, tiger, eagle, or the bird they call
_cuntur_ (condor), or some other bird of prey.'[108] To these
worshipful creatures 'men offered what they usually saw them eat' (i.
53). But men were not content to adore large and dangerous animals.
'There was not an animal, how vile and filthy soever, that they did
not worship as a god,' including 'lizards, toads, and frogs.' In the
midst of these superstitions the Incas appeared. Just as the tribes
claimed descent from animals, great or small, so the Incas drew
_their_ pedigree from the sun, which they adored like the _gens_ of
the Aurelii in Rome.[109] Thus every Indian had his _pacarissa_, or,
as the North American Indians say, _totem_,[110] a natural object
from which he claimed descent, and which, in a certain degree, he
worshipped. Though sun-worship became the established religion,
worship of the animal _pacarissas_ was still tolerated. The
sun-temples also contained _huacas_, or images, of the beasts which
the Indians had venerated.[111] In the great temple of Pachacamac,
the most spiritual and abstract god of Peruvian faith, 'they
worshipped a she-fox and an emerald. The devil also appeared to them,
and spoke in the form of a tiger, very fierce.'[112] This toleration
of an older and cruder, in subordination to a purer, faith is a very
common feature in religious evolution. In Catholic countries, to this
day, we may watch, in Holy Week, the Adonis feast described by
Theocritus,[113] and the procession and entombment of the old god of
spring.
'The Incas had the good policy to collect all the tribal animal gods
into their temples in and round Cuzco, in which the two leading gods
were the Master of Life, and the Sun.' Did a process of this sort ever
occur in Greek religion, and were older animal gods ever collected
into the temples of such deities as Apollo?
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Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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