The Inca People
Agriculture
Inca farming tools played a vital role in the development and rapid expansion of the Inca civilization. Farming, particularly in the Andean highlands, was essential to the stability and growth of the empire. These Inca tools were basic but effective, and are still used by the traditional Peru farming communities of the Andean highlands today. The chaquitaclla (also chakitaqlla or just taclla) was a human-powered Inca foot-plow and the most important of all the Inca farming tools.The Inca farmer would drive the end into the ground using both arms and one foot before levering the chakitaqlla upwards to break the soil. The chaquitaclla was particularly effective in the narrow Inca terraces; so effective, in fact, that it continues to be used in the highlands of Peru today. The raucana (also rawkana or azadon in Spanish) was a simple Inca hoe used to harvest tubers (particularly potatoes), remove weeds and prepare the ground for planting seeds.
Women
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The role of women in society was submissive, but not weak or unimportant. Women could help in the farms by harvesting crop and working long hours like thier husbands, take care of raising and punishing the children, cleaning and maintaining the house, and doing other household chores. Above all, birthing children was the primary focus of an Incan woman.
Incan Gods and Goddesses
Imahmana Viracocha and Tocapo Virachocha: creator and son of creator
Inti: sun god Konira Wirakocha: trickster, a prankster Mama Quilla:Goddess of the moon Manco Capac: son of Inti, also a solar god Pachamac:God of the earth, creator god Supai: death god Viracocha: Literally, Sea-Foam. The Creator Catequil: God of Thunder and Lightning The Inca's were a primeval civilization that lived in what is now present day Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Columbia, and Argentina. This kingdom lasted from 1800 B.C. to the early 1500s. The Inca's living grounds consisted of mountainous regions and dry scorching deserts along the Pacific Coast. The region suffered from devastating earthquakes, calamitous volcanoes, and horrifying hail storms. The Inca's believed the gods caused these ghastly events when they disobeyed them.
The Incas had a polytheistic belief, which means they believed in many gods. God's were very imperative to the Incas. The Incas believed that everything that happened for a reason and was caused by the gods. They believed the gods guarded everyone and everything and because of this they tried to please them. In order to please the gods, the Incas habitually performed sacrifices. The sacrificed foods, animals, and even people. Over a hundred kids were sacrificed to the rain god every year. Gods were a fundamental aspect to the Inca religion. Like the Mayas and Aztecs, the Incas believed in previous creations and destructions of the universe. However, the separation of cosmological time into major epochs of creation was not an essential concern of Incan religion. Instead, the Incas emphasized the arrangement of space into a sanctified geography. The most important female supernaturals were Pachamama, the earth; Mamacocha, the sea; and Mamaquilla, the moon. The core of Incan religion was predecessor worship. Ancestors were venerated as defensive spirits, and the bodies and tombs of the dead were treated as sacred objects. Many other important huacas were also explicitly acknowledged with the ancestors. For example, some of the most important shrines around Cusco were believed to be the alarmed forebears of the Incas. The bodies of dead rulers were among the holiest huacas in the Inca realm. As sons of Inti and embodiments of Illapa, the mummies of past rulers were the direct, visible links between the Incas and their pantheon. Maintaining these links, and through them the proper order of the universe, required perpetual care of the royal mummies. Religiously, the Incas were quite tolerant of the beliefs of their conquered subjects as long as the worship did not interfere with the new obligations laid upon them by Incan religious leaders. The Incan pantheon was also forced upon them over the pre-existing deities and was considered of greater importance. The prime deity of the Incas, as you may have guessed, is Viracocha, the Creator God. Although he is the prime deity, he was considered not among them and invisible. No temples were created for him. Inti, the Sun god, was thought to be his representation in the physical world. |
Worship
Gods and goddesses were worshiped by men and women but women felt a particular affinity for the moon and the goddesses of the earth and corn, the fertility deities. The Inca queen, the Inca's senior wife (who was usually also a sister of the Inca), was viewed as a link to the moon, queen and sister of the sun; she represented imperial authority to all women. Every month, the Incas held a huge and public religious festival honoring one of their major gods. At the festival, there was dancing and feasting and sacrifice. The Inca understood the world as composed of three levels: Uku Pacha, the past and interior world, Kay Pacha, the present world and Hanan Pacha, the future and superior world.
Inti is the sun god, also called as Apu-punchau, was believed to be the ancestor of the Incas. Inti was usually represented in human form, his face potrayed as a gold disk from which rays and flames extended. Inca legend says Inti taught Manco Capac and Mama Ocllo the art of civilization and then he sent them to earth so that they can bring civilization to earth. The Apu all possess certain superhuman physical attributes. They are true immortals who cease to age upon reaching adulthood, and they cannot die by conventional means. The apu have been worshipped by the Incas as well as other Aymaran - and quechuan- speaking peoples of the andes mountains from as early as 2000 B.C. to the sixteenth centuaryAD.
Inti is the sun god, also called as Apu-punchau, was believed to be the ancestor of the Incas. Inti was usually represented in human form, his face potrayed as a gold disk from which rays and flames extended. Inca legend says Inti taught Manco Capac and Mama Ocllo the art of civilization and then he sent them to earth so that they can bring civilization to earth. The Apu all possess certain superhuman physical attributes. They are true immortals who cease to age upon reaching adulthood, and they cannot die by conventional means. The apu have been worshipped by the Incas as well as other Aymaran - and quechuan- speaking peoples of the andes mountains from as early as 2000 B.C. to the sixteenth centuaryAD.