9. Hatun-poccoy (22 Feb.-22 March), Season of ripening.
10. Pacha-poccoy (22 March-22 April), Festival of Autumn Equinox. Mosoc Nina.
11. Ayrihua (22 April-22 May), Beginning of harvest.
12. Aymuray (22 May-22 June), Harvesting month. in Google’s copy
[1188] Judges xii. 39; 2 Kings iii. 27.
[1189] The sacrifices were called runa, yuyac, and huahua. The Spaniards thought that runa and yuyac signified men, and huahua children. This was not the case when speaking of sacrificial victims. Runa was applied to a male sacrifice, huahua to the lambs, and yuyac signified an adult or full-grown animal. The sacrificial animals were also called after the names of those who offered them, which was another cause of erroneous assumptions by Spanish writers. There was a law strictly prohibiting human sacrifices among the conquered tribes; and the statement that servants were sacrificed at the obsequies of their masters is disproved by the fact, mentioned by the anonymous Jesuit, that in none of the burial-places opened by the Spaniards in search of treasure were any human bones found, except those of the buried lord himself.
[1190] Prescott (I. p. 98, note) accepted the statement that human sacrifices were offered by the Incas, because six authorities, Sarmiento, Cieza de Leon, Montesinos, Balboa, Ondegardo, and Acosta—outnumbered the single authority on the other side, Garcilasso de la Vega, who, moreover, was believed to be prejudiced owing to his relationship to the Incas. Sarmiento and Cieza de Leon are one and the same, so that the number of authorities for human sacrifices is reduced to five. Cieza de Leon, Montesinos, and Balboa adopted the belief that human sacrifices were offered up, through a misunderstanding of the words yuyac and huahua. Acosta had little or no acquaintance with the language, as is proved by the numerous linguistic blunders in his work. Ondegardo wrote at a time when he scarcely knew the language, and had no interpreters; for it was in 1554, when he was judge at Cuzco. At that time all the annalists and old men had fled into the forests, because of the insurrection of Francisco Hernandez Giron.
The authorities who deny the practice are numerous and important. These are Francisco de Chaves, one of the best and most able of the original conquerors; Juan de Oliva; the Licentiate Alvarez; Fray Marcos Jofre; the Licentiate Falcon, in his Apologia pro Indis; Melchior Hernandez, in his dictionary, under the words harpay and huahua; the anonymous Jesuit in his most valuable narrative; and Garcilasso de la Vega. These eight authorities outweigh the five quoted by Prescott, both as regards number and importance. So that the evidence against human sacrifices is conclusive. The Quipus, as the anonymous Jesuit tells us, also prove that there was a law prohibiting human sacrifices.
The assertion that 200 children and 1,000 men were sacrificed at the coronation of Huayua Ccapac was made; but these “huahuas” were not children of men, but young lambs, which are called children; and the “yuyac” and “runa” were not men, but adult llamas. [Mr. Markham has elsewhere collated the authorities on this point (Royal Commentaries, i. 139). Cf. Bollaert’s Antiq. Researches, p. 124; and Alphonse Castaing on “Les Fêtes, Offrandes et Sacrifices dans l’Antiquité Peruvienne,” in the Archives de la Société Américaine de France, n. s. iii. 239.—Ed.]
[1191] The sacrificial llamas bore the names of the youths who presented them. Hence the Spanish writers, with little or no knowledge of the language, assumed that the youths themselves were the victims. (See ante, p. 237.)