Part 17 (1/2)

He tells us that the traditions and songs which the Indians had received from their remote ancestors related that in very early times there was a period when there was no sun, and men lived in darkness. At length, in answer to their urgent prayers, the sun emerged from Lake t.i.ticaca, and soon afterwards there came a man from the south, of fair complexion, large in stature, and of venerable presence, whose power was boundless. He removed mountains, filled up valleys, caused fountains to burst from the solid rocks, and gave life to men and animals. Hence the people called him the ”Beginning of all Created Things,” and ”Father of the Sun.” Many good works he performed, bringing order among the people, giving them wise counsel, working miracles and teaching. He went on his journey toward the north, but until the latest times they bore his deeds and person in memory, under the names of Tici Viracocha and Tuapaca, and elsewhere as Arnava. They erected many temples to him, in which they placed his figure and image as described.

They also said that after a certain length of time there re-appeared another like this first one, or else he was the same, who also gave wise counsel and cured the sick. He met disfavor, and at one spot the people set about to slay him, but he called down upon them fire from heaven, which burned their village and scorched the mountains into cinders. Then they threw away their weapons and begged of him to deliver them from the danger, which he did[1]. He pa.s.sed on toward the West until he reached the sh.o.r.e of the sea. There he spread out his mantle, and seating himself upon it, sailed away and was never seen again. For this reason, adds the chronicler, ”the name was given to him, _Viracocha_, which means Foam of the Sea, though afterwards it changed in signification.”[2]

[Footnote 1: This incident is also related by Pachacuti and Betanzos. All three locate the scene of the event at Carcha, eighteen leagues from Cuzco, where the Canas tribe lived at the Conquest. Pachacuti states that the cause of the anger of Viracocha was that upon the Sierra there was the statue of a woman to whom human victims were sacrificed. If this was the tradition, it would offer another point of ident.i.ty with that of Quetzalcoatl, who was also said to have forbidden human sacrifices.]

[Footnote 2: Herrera, _Historia de las Indias Occidentales_, Dec. v, Lib.

iii, cap. vi.]

This leads me to the etymology of the name. It is confessedly obscure. The translation which Herrera gives, is that generally offered by the Spanish writers, but it is not literal. The word _uira_ means fat, and _cocha_, lake, sea, or other large body of water; therefore, as the genitive must be prefixed in the Qquichua tongue, the translation must be ”Lake or Sea of Fat.” This was shown by Garcila.s.so de la Vega, in his _Royal Commentaries_, and as he could see no sense or propriety in applying such a term as ”Lake of Grease” to the Supreme Divinity, he rejected this derivation, and contented himself by saying that the meaning of the name was totally unknown.[1] In this Mr. Clements R. Markham, who is an authority on Peruvian matters, coincides, though acknowledging that no other meaning suggests itself.[2] I shall not say anything about the derivations of this name from the Sanskrit,[3] or the ancient Egyptian;[4]

these are etymological amus.e.m.e.nts with which serious studies have nothing to do.

[Footnote 1: ”Donde consta claro no ser nombre compuesto, sino proprio de aquella fantasma que dijo llama.r.s.e Viracocha y que era hijo del Sol.”

_Com, Reales_, Lib. v, cap. xxi.]

[Footnote 2: Introduction to _Narratives of the Rites and Laws of the Incas_, p. xi.]

[Footnote 3: ”Le nom de Viracocha dont la physionomie sanskrite est si frappante,” etc. Desjardins, _Le Perou avant la Conquete Espagnole_, p.

180 (Paris 1858).]

[Footnote 4: Viracocha ”is the Il or Ra of the Babylonian monuments, and thus the Ra of Egypt,” etc. Professor John Campbell, _Compte-Rendu du Congres International des Americanistes_, Vol. i, p. 362 (1875).]

The first and accepted derivation has been ably and to my mind successfully defended by probably the most accomplished Qquichua scholar of our age, Senor Gavino Pacheco Zegarra, who, in the introduction to his most excellent edition of the Drama of _Ollanta_, maintains that Viracocha, literally ”Lake of Fat,” was a simile applied to the frothing, foaming sea, and adds that as a personal name in this signification it is in entire conformity with the genius of the Qquichua tongue[1].

[Footnote 1: _Ollantai, Drame en vers Quechuas_, Introd., p. x.x.xvi (Paris, 1878). There was a cla.s.s of diviners in Peru who foretold the future by inspecting the fat of animals; they were called Vira-piricuc. Molina, _Fables and Rites_, p. 13.]

To quote his words:--”The tradition was that Viracocha's face was extremely white and bearded. From this his name was derived, which means, taken literally, 'Lake of Fat;' by extension, however, the word means 'Sea-Foam,' as in the Qquichua language the foam is called _fat_, no doubt on account of its whiteness.”

It had a double appropriateness in its application to the hero-G.o.d. Not only was he supposed in the one myth to have risen from the waves of Lake t.i.ticaca, and in another to have appeared when the primeval ocean left the land dry, but he was universally described as of fair complexion, _a white man_. Strange, indeed, it is that these people who had never seen a member of the white race, should so persistently have represented their highest G.o.ds as of this hue, and what is more, with the flowing beard and abundant light hair which is their characteristic.

There is no denying, however, that such is the fact. Did it depend on legend alone we might, however strong the consensus of testimony, harbor some doubt about it. But it does not. The monuments themselves attest it.

There is, indeed, a singular uniformity of statement in the myths.

Viracocha, under any and all his surnames, is always described as white and bearded, dressed in flowing robes and of imposing mien. His robes were also white, and thus he was figured at the entrance of one of his most celebrated temples, that of Urcos. His image at that place was of a man with a white robe falling to his waist, and thence to his feet; by him, cut in stone, were his birds, the eagle and the falcon.[1] So, also, on a certain occasion when he was said to have appeared in a dream to one of the Incas who afterwards adopted his name, he was said to have come with beard more than a span in length, and clothed in a large and loose mantle, which fell to his feet, while with his hand he held, by a cord to its neck, some unknown animal. And thus in after times he was represented in painting and statue, by order of that Inca.[2]

[Footnote 1: Christoval de Molina, _ubi supra_, p. 29.]

[Footnote 2: Garcila.s.so de la Vega, _Comentarios Reales_, Lib. iv, cap.

xxi.]

An early writer tells us that the great temple of Cuzco, which was afterwards chosen for the Cathedral, was originally that of Illa Ticci Viracocha. It contained only one altar, and upon it a marble statue of the G.o.d. This is described as being, ”both as to the hair, complexion, features, raiment and sandals, just as painters represent the Apostle, Saint Bartholomew.”[1]

[Footnote 1: _Relacion anonima_, p. 148.]

Misled by the statements of the historian Garcila.s.so de la Vega, some later writers, among whom I may note the eminent German traveler Von Tschudi, have supposed that Viracocha belonged to the historical deities of Peru, and that his wors.h.i.+p was of comparatively recent origin.[1] La Vega, who could not understand the name of the divinity, and, moreover, either knew little about the ancient religion, or else concealed his knowledge (as is shown by his reiterated statement that human sacrifices were unknown), pretended that Viracocha first came to be honored through a dream of the Inca who a.s.sumed his name. But the narrative of the occurrence that he himself gives shows that even at that time the myth was well known and of great antiquity.[2]

[Footnote 1: ”La princ.i.p.al de estas Deidades historicas era _Viracocha_.

* * * Dos siglos contaba el culto de Viracocha a la llegada de los Espanoles.” J. Diego de Tschudi, _Antiguedades Peruanas_, pp. 159, 160 (Vienna, 1851).]

[Footnote 2: Compare the account in Garcila.s.so de la Vega, _Comentarios Reales_, Lib. ii, cap. iv; Lib. iv, cap. xxi, xxiii, with that in Acosta, _Historia Natural y Moral de las Indias_, Lib. vi, cap. xxi.]

The statements which he makes on the authority of Father Blas Valera, that the Inca Tupac Yupanqui sought to purify the religion of his day by leading it toward the contemplation of an incorporeal G.o.d,[3] is probably, in the main, correct. It is supported by a similar account given by Acosta, of the famous Huayna Capac. Indeed, they read so much alike that they are probably repet.i.tions of teachings familiar to the n.o.bles and higher priests. Both Incas maintained that the Sun could not be the chief G.o.d, because he ran daily his accustomed course, like a slave, or an animal that is led. He must therefore be the subject of a mightier power than himself.