Princesa Inca® Story
Mythology
According to archaeologists and anthropologists, the original civilizations of the ancient world were six: Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, India, Mesoamerica, and the Andes (Pre-Inca and Inca).
Throughout history, the Princesa Inca®, daughter of the Sun, was part of the vast Inca mythology. A Princess who deeply loved her culture, worldview, and the noble art of metals and minerals.
Wira Qocha main God of Inca mythology, the great father, the creator of all things in the Universe, emerged from the depths of Lake Titicaca, had a son "Sol" (Inti) and two daughters "Luna" (Mama Quilla) and "Earth" (Pachamama). The sun (Inti), had two older children Manco Cápac and Mama Ocllo who emerged from Lake Titicaca to whom he gave a golden scepter, giving them the mission of sinking it where the founded Inca civilization would be, sinking the golden scepter until disappearing in the sacred city of Cusco”, capital of the vast Empire of the Incas.
Sometime later the "Sun" that was life for the Pre-Columbian world came out very sad in the morning, illuminating without strength, almost without being able to speak, for everything he saw coming, suddenly one day he stopped to think and felt a slight breath, seizing an infinite smile, a light of life and with the blessing of Wira Qocha during the “Inti Raymi” at the arrival of the winter solstice, on the shortest day and longest night of the year, between On June 20 and 24 at "Sacred Hour", she conceived a daughter with a tender gaze and a beautiful word, of a semi-divine nature, whom she called the "Princesa Inca®".
A Princess who lived touring the entire Tawantinsuyo, assiduously in the capital of the Inca empire that was the center of power "Cuzco" and the sacred place of great beauty with a mystery alo the great "Machu Picchu", the city among the clouds, in the highest peaks of the Andes mountain range and the Amazon jungle, protected by mountains and rivers, that to get there you had to make a pilgrimage, prepare your soul and body because not everyone could enter the city, you had to go through tests and tour “The Inca Trail” a rugged route that the most reckless Incas challenged. Once arrived at Machu Picchu, the man was impressed for being a masterpiece, which inspired respect for its architecture and engineering of temples, palaces, platforms, terraces, and stone infrastructures aligned to astronomical phenomena. The place that Pachacutec had built for ceremonial use or a sanctuary where the nobles and the sacred virgins of the sun worshiped the gods of the cosmos, also used as a military fortress or retreat for the Inca nobility, its real purpose remains a mystery.
Happy times of an ancient culture of authentic values and knowledge, with an Andean worldview where all living beings are a gift of creation, have souls connected with nature and the Gods. A universe where the Gods Wira Qocha Father, the "Sun" son and other divinities like earth, water, stars, sea, lightning, mountains, among others, live, where the "Sun" is the supreme symbol that it gives life to all living beings that inhabit the cosmos. A society where there was no hunger and poverty, with an economy that was based mainly on agriculture, but also livestock and crafts. The currency was not known, so the payment was through barter.
They lived with the belief that the soul was immortal, since death represented a journey towards another life, carrying out continuity within the existential and universal totality—a world of mysticism and spirituality where one lives with reciprocity, peace, and eternal harmony.
For the Incas, all works of art were inspired by the magical-religious, the most faithful reflection of their gods, the artists who dazzled by the beauty of their work deserved to be remembered in posterity, performing various artistic manifestations, for example in jewelry, silverwork, and sculpture, they looked at the metals when they worked as if they were living beings that grew like tree roots, ruled by the stars and the care of God, so the gold grew under the influence of the Sun, silver under the moon, copper under Venus and tin under Jupiter, making beautiful alloys including bronze. An infinity of beautiful works of art that keep mysteries made of gold, silver, and precious stones to offer to the gods who received all the best.
Until all changes, with the arrival of the Spanish invasion, I was amazed at the discovery of riches and treasures of the Inca empire, marking the beginning of a significant transformation that exceeds all the looting and massacres in the history of the world, with confrontations and wars to desecrate tombs, temples, palaces and destroy the wisdom of the Incas. An empire of tragic vicissitudes. Oh, "Peru of gold, silver, precious stones and melancholy!"
To save this legacy, the Princesa Inca® and Choqui Auqui (golden prince, one of the sons of Emperor Huayna Cápac, brother of Huáscar and Atahualpa) ran, being guarded by the royal entourage of master amautas, priests, virgins of the sun, acllas, nobles and warriors to quickly move and hide along the hidden route that few knew: the sacred treasures, the mummies of the Inca emperors and the solar disk (An object and sacred instrument of supernatural power, which could open dimensional portals, gigantic gold solid as a gold-bearing crystal, representing the "Sun"); you dare chinkanas (entrances to the underground world of labyrinths, corridors, caves, and long tunnels) that cover the entire Peruvian subsoil, reaching even more countries in South America, where they point out that the starting point is under the Coricancha, heading to Sacsayhuaman, royal palaces and towards the city made of gold, that the Spanish never found and that many are still looking for, the great Paititi.
Paititi, the secret and legendary most magnificent kingdom of the Incas, that the ancient Queros of the Andes reported that it was located to the East of Cusco, between the deep jungle of the east and the mountains, where not only is the dream of any man guarded and protected of riches and treasures but also the secret of the Incas: the history of a civilization that connected the earth with the universe, the lineage of its gods, the knowledge that originated it and the wisdom and sacred knowledge of the power of the word, mind, and heart.
Once the Inca Princess arrived in Paititi, she could not avoid tears because of the sadness of what happened in her empire, she spent days without eating, without drinking water, without moving, she just chewed her sacred coca leaves, raising prayers and prayers to her gods to protect the Tawantinsuyo, suddenly with sad eyes and a cut-off voice was slowly fading like a star in the vast silence of the night.
It was time to wake up, and she was not reacting, so they invoked her looking at her with songs and dances, allegorically staging feats of the places she had lived, the clothes and artistic objects she had worn, the traditions and customs she had transmitted and all the beautiful adventures they had shared.
For a long time, the mourning virgins of the sun and acllas walked from here to there, cried and sent to perform secret masses and rites on all the city's altars, hoping that they would return to life. They cried aloud, Oh Sun, Oh Mama Keel, Oh Pachamama! Oh, Princesa Inca® come back!
With much sadness and melancholy, they felt that they had already made the journey to the afterlife with their ancestors, jeweled her body with gold dust and they placed a precious mascapaycha with the feather of the sacred bird "Corekenke," dismissing her between prayers and songs.
Princesa Inca® an ancestral messenger of the spirit of the Incas, a connoisseur of the past, present and future that accompanied the Pre-Columbian civilization, full of adventures and mysteries, that one day, as well as came, disappeared in time to someday return to honor and transmit their culture with love to each heart, leaving an ancient history, surrounded by mysticism, passed down from generation to generation. What better name and representative than the Princesa Inca® in honor of the historical legacy she left us, a beautiful and emblematic name to remember.
Inti Raymi Sun's Festival
The story tells that Princesa Inca® was conceived during the "Inti Raymi," the majestic and colorful most crucial celebration of the mighty Inca empire of respect and faith to an ancient culture, ¡Viva ! that is revived every year celebrated in the center of the planet, where the primary purpose is the adoration and gratitude to the God. "Sun", supreme symbol and creator of the Incas, for life, for wealth, for the warmth to the earth, for future harvests, for the beginning of the Andean New Year and the renewal of an eternal union, in the middle of aloof magic and mystery.
Mysticism and spirituality are an essential part of this festival, the transmission of values and knowledge about the life and interpretation of the world of the Incas, where the days of the solstice and the Milky Way were of utmost importance, a bridge that connected the physical world with the heavenly world of the gods. All living beings in nature are considered to have souls and are a gift of creation, men, animals, plants, and the likes, and each one prepares with joy this encounter of dialogue with the beings of the cosmos, with the firm purpose of finding answers to everything that they could not resolve on their way and must return to their ordinary course and resolve at the time of this encounter, some damage to some being of nature, affects imbalance and chaos.
The Inti Raymi is a true encounter with our divinity, where the Andean cosmovision philosophy of "good living" prevails, where one lives in communion, harmony, and eternally, so in the Andean wisdom doesn’t exist the world "I", instead exist "We". Spiritual renewal and a sacred meeting of energies through instruments, songs, and dances, which symbolize the movement of the earth with rotational turns, translation and a magical flight to meet the gods, from the moment you begin to feel it, in a time that is not linear with a beginning and an end, but in a circular time, where there is energy at all times and is like a spiral, which follows its cyclical rhythm, interconnected and is continuously born.
The Chakana
The enigmatic symbol of this Andean worldview is the Chakana, which is “Andean cross”; the key to communication between the world of earth and the world of heaven, a stepped symbol that represents Andean thought, the universe, and a cosmic connotation related to the southern cross. The Incas had their way of seeing the world, where space and time were sacred, with a mythical explanation and a ritual representation, where the Andean cross represented the four worlds of life:Uku Pacha: The world below, underground, representing death, those unborn babies, spirits, and diseases. Its animal is the snake.
Kay Pacha: The earthly world, the present where we live, which represents the life of men, animals, and plants. Its animal is the cougar.
Hanan Pacha: The world of the heavens, of the cosmos representing the sun, the moon, the constellations, the stars, and the most important deities that live there. Its animal is the condor.
This legacy of the Andes dates back to the beginnings of the Inca empire, a ceremony that in the past lasted approximately one month and was performed in parallel in all the peoples of the empire.
The Preparation
Days before the main ceremony of Inti Raymi, the prepared began; they didn’t eat, they began a rigorous fast, feeding only on white corn, water, and the sacred grass Chuca, during all that time it was forbidden to light a fire throughout the city and to abstain from sleeping with women . Dancers, singers, musicians, and participants performed prayers so that the next few days they can sustain themselves with their art and fulfill their requests; They also performed purification steam baths (ancestral sauna with special herbs), which represented the experience of being inside our mother's womb, being born again and remembering who we are. Once the preparation was finished, they had to dress in their beautiful finery to start a grand celebration.
Thus began activities by the Inca and his royal entourage, followed by mamaconas and acllas who prepared delicacies such as corn muffins, toasted corn, corn chicha, and symbolic viands, and sankhu, which were eaten only twice a year.
The "Virgins of the Sun," as women of the "Sun," prepared the main delicacies of sankhu (sacred bread), and sacred chicha for the sun and royalty, because it would have to seem that the "Sol" himself prepared it with his hands for your children (clean from sin). These offerings were to reach not only for the Kuracas and nobles but for the entire Inca nation.
A concentration of Andean cultural expressions in all their fullness, where the coya participated, followed by virgins of the sun, ñustas, acllas, priests, kuracas, panacas, delegates of the four of them, among others. Participants wore their most significant and colorful finery, dressed in blankets, robes, fabrics, Imperial Guard suits with weapons, bows, and arrows, bowlers, animal fursuits, and large feathers iridescence, and masks, all plated with gold and silver. Artistic tattoos of symbolic meanings on faces and bodies.
A Display of Fine Arts
The Inti Raymi, brings with it a dazzling show of "Fine Arts" in the ceremonial sense of jewelry, goldsmithing, sculpture, and painting, all in fine gold, fine silver, and precious stones such as turquoise, emeralds, and others:
- Jewelry: necklaces, bracelets, ear muffs, rings.
- Goldsmithing: patenas on the heads, patenillas on the beard, garlands on headdresses, masks, and vessels.
- Sculpture: small and large artistic objects, pieces of human statues, animals, and plants.
- Paintings: the beautiful pictorial art of feats at the service of the sun and the Incas.
The Inti Raymi Route
A show that was covered in three steps: in the “Temple of the Coricancha” (where the golden garden was located), continuing in the “Plaza de Armas del Cuzco” and culminating (main ceremony) in the consecrated “Fortaleza de Sacsayhuamán”.From dawn, the Inca, the royalty and the 12 royal panacas waited for the arrival of the star king the “Sun,” barefoot, on his knees and with open arms, when he appeared on the horizon, they received him with hugs, kisses in the air and songs of worship.
The "Temple of the Coricancha" entered the first stop: the Inca, the coya, the virgins of the sun, the royal procession and the nobility; the Inca was located on a stone altar where was the image of the “Solar Disc” (A sacred object and instrument of supernatural power, which could open dimensional portals, gigantic solid gold like a gold crystal, representing the Sun) and there the Inca began and directed the ceremony invoking and asking permission from the God "Sun" and giving glory to Cuzco and Tahuantinsuyo, then the Inca followed a procession and in the middle the offerings that came from the kuracas (chiefs of the towns) that they had collected from all the empire: beautiful works of art, sculptures, goldsmiths, loads of rich blankets, gifts of the great symbolic value of gold, silver, precious stones and spondylus.
Then the Inca was transporting to the second stop: the “Plaza de Armas del Cuzco”, on his shoulders on a gold-plated walk, accompanied by the dried apricots, where there was a delight of beautiful Quechua songs, combinations of pututus musical instruments, quenas, panpipes, cornets, flutes, tambourines, atabales, trumpets, seashells and impressive dances such as cayo, snake, huayllina (Previously the dancers must have prayed), expressions of the Andean worldview, a parade where a large number of residents expected it, to carry out the celebration of "The meeting of the times and the coca ceremony".
Later, the Inca and his entourage went to the third and main stop: the consecrated "Fortress Sacsayhuamán" where the "Coya" was walked throughout the esplanade, while the Inca gave a greeting and blessing to all the participants, a ritual With sacred chicha in a golden glass in the left hand and another glass in the right hand offering to the sun and pouring it into a gold vat, the sacred chicha was from the purest corn (chicha of Jora).
The Gratefulness Ritual
A manifestation of thanks in honor of the "Sun" because it brings new dawn where it gives life to all living beings that inhabit the cosmos, that is why it offers him all the best because everything comes from him and he must return, the sun that gives away their gifts, with its rays feeds energy, vitality and gives the strength that is in the hearts and a manifestation of a political content where the loyalty to the Inca Emperor was reiterated.
Then began the music and dances of the nobles of the different regions who felt that life was dancing, who consumed sacred plants such as wachuma (sacred cactus San Pedro), inhaled rapé (sacred powder of natural tobacco with bark and tree leaves) and they blew brandy, thus reaffirming the purpose of their lives with the Great Spirit.
Following the ritual, the "Sacred Fire" had to be delivered by the hand of the "Sun" himself as a sign of renewal and protection: when the sun appeared its rays were captured by a sumo gold bracelet (large, concave, burnished as a mirror) priest whose reflections naturally projected and began to fire on a piece of cotton, which burned with sticks. The burning fire was distributed until reaching the most remote regions of the entire empire and above all received and preserved by the "Virgins of the Sun" who had to take care of it and keep it alive for a year until it was changed by the new fire of the following year of the Inti Raymi, if that fire went out it was taken as a sign of bad omen.
Following a "Ritual of Auguries" by the sages and seers to know the destiny of the coming year, if the luck was good they strengthened themselves by cheering the hearts with songs, dances, and dances amid offerings by the acllas of the three coca leaves, sacred cornbread (Sankhu) and chicha of Jora.
The Closing Ceremony
Following a procession of "Inca Mummies," they were honored and remembered, sprinkling the path of coca, flowers, and colored feathers, accompanied by the "Pichaq," men who scared away with evil brooms the evil spirits that could be in the road.
Continuing the Procession of "Moroy Urco": a golden cord, worshiped as if it were the god "Sun", of an extraordinary length that surrounded the place, where the dancers held on singing, as they walked the perimeter traveled, followed by "Rituals of Worship ”to the Apu (Spirit of the mountain), Mama Quilla (Moon), Pachamama (Earth) Moreover, other deities, numerous offerings buried in their names, amid sweet melodious songs by the“ Virgins of the Sun ”and acllas.
Finally, the Inca towards the closing calls again to the "Sun" to receive the blessing of the sacred light over the entire empire and offers a great banquet, followed by dances and a burst of unbridled hubbub that lasts for several days.
One of the most beautiful and spectacular ceremonies worldwide that are still alive, Princesa Inca® remembers her birth and culture.Millennial stories of knowledge and secrets that still await to be revealed.