Thursday, November 27, 2014

Why QUINOA, AMARANTH, and PURPLE CORN were sacred to the INCAS?

Quinoa, Amaranth, and Purple Corn were sacred to the Incas because they were extremely rich sources of Iron, Copper, Manganese, and Zinc. They had the highest contribution to mineral intake to the human body.
They were considered sacred given the fact that because of their highest content of minerals, their use in rituals facilitated the transition of movements of sacred energies along the ceques (energy points).
They considered them a gift from the Creator (Viracocha). Through its consumption the cleansing of the negative energies were performed prior the engagements of rituals forming a strong and  clear path of communication between energies coming from the cosmological plane and the earth.
The Incas developed a unique culture that unified Nature and People together into the same fabric of life.
The bond made between earthly and spiritual realms was meant to be there and never be broken.
Purification and working with a clear mind and sincere heart were essential in asking the spirit of the land to provide for the people.
They kept the belief that if you do things in a very good way, good things were meant to follow. If carefully attention were not established between the planes, the result were expected not to be good. War and Famine would appear as a direct consequence from the negligence performed by the unclean ones.
Energy Vortices or Sacred Sites filled with subtle and concentrated energy were located at various geophysical places along the Inca Empire.
It was stated that crystals and minerals were a direct connection to the balance of the energy's lines of the Earth's plane and responsible for maintaining the stability of the earth, and at the same time maintaining the correct magnetic vibration in connection with the planets in the Universe.
The importance of the maintaining a proper harmony of planet Earth in relation to the Sun and Moon was sacred.
The misuse of personal power and misuse of crystals and improper cleansing of the physical human body were instrumental in their beliefs for the demise of their empire.

Monday, November 10, 2014

How come in the Inca society were no thieves?

The Incan empire differed form The Aztecs and Mayan civilization in the way in which the human society responded in a unique way to its formidable land.
The Incan  empire comprised modern Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile and  northwestern Argentina.
The boundaries of the empire had a land of desert in the West, the rain forest to the East, and between these extremes the high plateaus and glacial peaks of the Cordillera of the Andes, which formed the central line like if we compare these bodies of land to our human body, the way of the mountains formed the spine in which the whole entity connected itself.
They created a true empire with a sophisticated 14,000 miles of paved roads that helped to unite the many ethnic groups that formed the empire. They encouraged independent kingdoms to join their empire peacefully.
The Incan empire was rural, centralized, and its primary medium of exchange was labour. Cheaf among these were safeguards against famine, which only a large state with good stores and communications could provide.
The system that they developed may seem laborious to our point of view, but it really was the creation of a society that produced the world's finest weaving and set great store by the practical and metaphorical properties of thread. They maintained their records with great accuracy, unfortunately the invaders characterized by a high level of ignorance, destroyed whatever they thought it was the work of witchcraft. This is the reason why little is known of the Incas' intellectual life. They kept their records by quipu, a sort of medium in which only the statistician and chroniclers were the ones who ran it.
The Incas had an advanced arithmetic using zero and place notation. They were familiar with the counting in tens and so on.
When the invaders saw the way in which the Inca society moved on, they were so surprised that there were no thieves, no vicious men, no idlers. They showed so much wisdom and committed so few crimes that no evil thing was found in great scale among them.
The society was based in the belief that peace and prosperity only embraced them when each one of them were purified of any evil force  acting in them.

Thursday, November 6, 2014

Who was PACHAYACHACHIC?

To understand fully the concept of the word we have to start with the prefix PACHA. It means "earth,"
"ground," "matter." In the word PACHACUTEC means the overturning or metamorphosis of "pacha."
In the word PACHAYACHACHIC means "the one who teaches the "pacha."
Comparing both, it leads to notice that "pacha" could be unsettled, converted or changing, and at the same time, it can be taught to help in the settling or changing of its energy forces.
Pachayachachic is a word used to describe the highest deity, the one who is both unreachable and unnameable. It is linked with VIRACOCHA in a way of a relationship between the energy forces.
In the CEQUES, the whole theological philosophy of the Inca religion is presented in a small scale, similar to the way in which the Incas and the people before them developed an agricultural testing station in MORAY.
The site is located in the sacred valley. It consists of four deep depressions, which was enlarged and terraced, forming a parabolic shapes like radar dishes. This shape enabled the worker of the soil to mimic a number of different climates by changing the aspect, elevation, humidity and soil type, all within the same area, to obtain a high quality harvest.
In Cuzco, 350 or shrines were divided into four large regions that coincided with the four regions of the empire. They were aligned from the CORICANCHA in a radiating shape pointing to the four cardinal points. Certain roads of energy also emanated from the central point of temple of the sun.
These CEQUES (energy points) became four paths corresponding in sequence to the four royal paths that came out at the same time of the royal city of Cuzco.
The Pachayachachic deity was not limited to the ceques that were the holders of the cosmic energy grabbed by the Huacas and shrines located in them. Rather the Huacas and shrines were places that connected this unfolding energy to the Teacher of the Pacha. The joining of the three cosmic planes produced an enormous bolt or opening that the only one capable of sustain it was The Mediator.
The Mediator was part of a triad or trinity of forces in which Pachayachachi was in the form of a Father, the day force was represented by the deity Punchau and the lightning force represented by the deity Inti-Illapa.
The shrines were related to the members of the trinity in the three cosmical levels or planes making in total nine organized in groups of three, according to the rhythm or pattern of Father, Son and Younger Son.  In the same way Cuzco was the central point of the cosmic energy, representing the Father, then Machu Picchu (Old Mountain) representing the older son, and Huayna Picchu (Younger Mountain) representing the younger son.

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Who were the MOCHES? (100BCE - 800EC)

The name MOCHE derives from the Moche Valley which, along the Chicama Valley were the heart of the Moche Culture.
In a strict visual context, the MOCHE's art style is one of the most representational styles in the ancient Andes.
It is rich in symbolism that gives us an idea of the beliefs and functions of its religious centers. They built large ceremonial places known as "huacas," that served as receptors of sacred cosmic energies that were received throughout their cosmic ceremonial calendar. This places were also used as burial site for Moche elite.
Geometric designs, portrayals of supernatural entities and events, warriors engaged in combat, captives, plants and animals, architectural structures, are among the subjects chosen by Moche's artists in their representations of their people and their beliefs.
One particular type of a decorated ceramic vessel named "the stirrup-spout"consists of a globular body from which two tubes emerge and join together to make a central spout. It is 2000 years old. It is being priced for their symbolic meaning of dualism, which is the basic ingredient of the Andean religious beliefs.
Another  stirrup-spout vessel at the Museo Larco portraits a deity called "Wrinkle Face"(occasionally referred to as AIPAEC meaning "the Creator", QUISMIQUE, meaning 'the Old One; the Fanged God and the Serpent belt God) and his consort having sexual intercourse. The peculiarity of the scenery is that the figures are not placed face to face, instead the masculine figure of the god is behind her, and at the same time he is grasping her chin with his right hand, a gesture that sometimes occurs in examples showing combat scenes in which the triumphant warrior grasps the chin of a captive.
Another peculiarity of the Moche's art is the highly realistic and individualized busts of personalities having mushrooms either on top or on the side of their heads.
The highly pictorial quality of small scale Moche art follows consistent rules and aims for clarity in interpreting them. It minimize ambiguity. It focus on action, movement and interaction between figures. They used techniques such as scale and vertical positioning to indicates depth of fields and a type of "locators" to indicate that a physical setting is being in use. It also uses symmetry and reversible imagery and the metaphorical transformation of parts of figures into other forms or entities.
The relationship between  objects, concepts and events described in the subject of rituals were used as a  tool of human language and serve as a basis for understanding the world through logic thinking.
The human body served as the model for understanding the world. I  that context human sexuality was linked to a larger-scale phenomena such as social organization and agricultural planting seasons (fertility imagery).

Saturday, November 1, 2014

MUSHROOMS, were they familiar to the Incas?

Considering that the MOCHICA-CHIMU cultures connected directly to both MOCHE and WARI and to the INCA cultures, the understanding of the rituals in which the role of the mushrooms played an important part, were well known during the time of the Incan Empire.
The INCAS were known to incorporate other beliefs or religions and worship into their own as seen in PACHACAMAC and other religious sites that belonged to the conquered cultures.

The Moche (100 BCE-800 EC), a culture known for its spectacular archaeological finds, produced in their ceramics anthropomorphic beings with representations of mushrooms. They provide the most expressive, varied and the most clear evidence of all Peruvian Cultures that mushrooms were used in their everyday life and played an important symbolism in their spiritual beliefs.
Moche art provivides a window in which we can observe the mind and rituals of its people, creating in us a unique chance to better understand the role of mushrooms in the ancient Peruvian world.
They display three different levels of understanding. The first level use a REALISTIC representation of them. The second level is SUBTLE "hidden" that are easily missed if one is not looking for them, but clear when one has found them. The third level is an ABSTRACT SYMBOLIC or iconographic representation or uses with which they were associated.

On the North West of Lake TITICACA, in the town of Chucuito, there are finely carved stones in the shape of mushrooms. The age of the stones is unknown and the purpose remains a mystery.
To create a tourist attraction, the site was declared as a "Temple of Fertility"named IncaUyo.

The Pucara (1200 BCE-400CE), a highland culture had a very deep influence in the region for the Tiahuanco and Wari cultures that followed after their demise.  The Pucara site was built under a rock formation which looks like a feline shape, most likely, a puma shape.
They have a strong visual evidence that mushrooms were used ritually. They also produced mushroom shaped stones.