The island of Coata, a league to the eastward of Titicaca, was dedicated to the Moon, the name being derived from Coyata, the accusative of Coya, a queen; the Moon ranking as wife to the Sun. The ruins of the _Accla huasi_, or convent of virgins, on Coata island, are 120 feet long, the interior being divided into numerous cells, with rows of niches in the walls. They are now overshadowed by queñua-trees, whose dark foliage adds to the sombre melancholy of these silent memorials of the past. On both the islands there were, in the time of the Incas, large establishments of Virgins of the Sun, who were divided into three grades, according to their beauty. The most lovely were called _Guayruro_; the next _Yurac Aclla_, or white maidens; and the plain ones _Paco Aclla_, or beast maidens. Each grade was governed by a _Mamacona_ or nurse, and an _Apu-panaca_ or governor lived near the convent, who guarded it, and supplied its inmates with provisions. The occupations of the virgins were weaving, embroidery, and brewing sacrificial _chicha_, to be poured out on the altar of the deity.[158] After the conquest, the Spanish Viceroys handed over the province of Chucuito, and the islands in the lake, to the Dominican friars, who succeeded in introducing far grosser and more degrading superstitions amongst the Indians than they had ever practised on the islands of Titicaca and Coata; and in establishing, on the adjacent peninsula of Copacabana, a shrine, the pretended sanctity of which attracted devotees and rich presents from all parts of Spanish America.