§ (B) Peru before the Arrival of the Spaniards
The "national myth" of the Peruvians was that at Lake Titicaca two supernatural beings appeared, both children of the Sun. One was Manco Capac, the first Inca, who taught the people agriculture; the other was his wife, who taught the women to spin and weave. From them were lineally derived all the Incas. As representing the Sun, the Inca was high priest and head of the hierarchy, and therefore presided at the great religious festivals. He was the source from which everything flowed—all dignity, all power, all emolument. Louis le Magnifique when at the height of his power might be taken as a type of the emperor Inca: both could literally use the phrase, L'état c'est Moi, "The State! I am the State!"
In the royal palaces and dress great barbaric pomp was assumed. All the apartments were studded with gold and silver ornaments.
The worship of the Sun, representing the Creator, the Dweller in Space, the Teacher and Ruler of the Universe,[25] was the religion of the Incas inherited from their distant ancestry. The great temple at Cuzco, with its gorgeous display of riches, was called "the place of gold, the abode of the Teacher of the Universe." An elliptical plate of gold was fixed on the wall to represent the Deity.
Sufficient evidence is still visible of the engineering industry evinced by the natives before the arrival of Pizarro. We give some particulars of the two principal highways, both joining Quito to Cuzco, then passing south to Chile. First, the high level road, 1,600 miles in length, crossing the great Peruvian table-land, and conducted over pathless sierras buried in snow; with galleries cut for leagues through the living rock, rivers crossed by means of bridges, and ravines of hideous depth filled up with solid masonry. The roadway consisted of heavy flags of freestone. Secondly, the low level highway along the coast country between the Andes and the Pacific. The prehistoric engineers had here to encounter quite a different task. The causeway was raised on a high embankment of earth, with trees planted along the margin. In the strips of sandy waste, huge piles (many of them to be seen to this day) were driven into the ground to indicate the route.
Another colossal effort was the conveyance of water to the rainless country by the seacoast, especially to certain parts capable of being reclaimed and made fertile. Some of the aqueducts were of great length—one measuring between 400 and 500 miles.
The following table gives the Peruvian calendar for a year:
| I. Raymi, the Festival of the Winter Solstice, | |
| in honor of the Sun | June 22d. |
| Season of plowing | July 22d. |
| Season of sowing | August 22d. |
| II. Festival of the Spring Equinox | September 22d. |
| Season of brewing | October 22d. |
| Commemoration of the Dead | November 22d. |
| III. Festival of the Summer Solstice December 22d. | |
| Season of exercises | January 22d. |
| Season of ripening | February 22d. |
| IV. Festival of Autumn Equinox | March 22d. |
| Beginning of harvest | April 22d. |
| Harvesting month | May 22d. |
Since Quito is exactly on the equator, the vertical rays of the sun at noon during the equinox cast no shadow. That northern capital, therefore, was "held in especial veneration as the favored abode of the great deity."
At the feast of Raymi, or New Year's day, the sacrifice usually offered was that of the llama, a fire being kindled by means of a concave mirror of polished metal collecting the rays of the sun into a focus upon a quantity of dried cotton.