Getting High in Peru: The Inca Templo del Sol in Cusco

Cusco, Peru: Inca Templo del Sol

In Cusco, and below the giant statue of Jesus ...

... is the statue of Atahualpa and nearby is ...

... the Convento de Santo Domingo built over the ruins of the Inca Temple of the Sun.

This is a good place in Cusco to begin your tour of Inca sites. A colonial church and convent of Santo Domingo now covers the former Inca Temple of the Sun (Templo del Sol). Its Inca or Quechua name is Qorikancha, meaning ‘Golden Courtyard’ since in Inca times the temple walls were said to be covered with 700 solid-gold sheets, each weighing perhaps 2kgs (4.4lbs). Only the lower courses of the well-crafted stonework remain.

In addition to the gold sheets, this temple was said to contain gold and silver replicas of corn ears, llamas, gold-covered altars, and the like so it is easy to picture that when the Spanish took over the temple, it was stripped of its gold, which was then melted down to be shipped to Spain. This was quite the loss for the Inca, for Peru, and for us today but not for the then conquistadors, the royal house of Spain and its fleet of ships which were then built.

One of the nearby sites we’ll visit is Qenqo, which has a mummification table. One of the Inca rites said to be held in the Temple del Sol was that the mummified bodies of the previous kings were brought out each day to be ritually fed food and drink. In the center of the courtyard, where the flower pots now stand was an octagonal font said to have been covered with 55kgs of solid gold [“said to…” the stories were recorded 15 or more years after the Spanish stripped off the gold.]. To the right were the major temples dedicated to the moon and stars, with their room walls covered with sheets of silver. To the left were the smaller temples dedicated to thunder and the rainbow. Note that the floors are covered with pebbles to protect the original Inca floors. Today, these former temples are heavily trafficked with tourists. 

The courtyard where the fountain once stood

The location for the former temples of Thunder and Rainbow

Note the pebble surface protecting the Inca surface

 

Example of Inca finely-cut and well-laid stone walls that have withstood time.

Drain for blood sacrifices?

Looking across the way to the former location of the temples dedicated to the Moon and Stars

Now at location of the former Temples dedicated to the Moon and Stars

 

Walls formerly covered with sheets of silver

The temple was built in the mid-15^th century by the 10^th Inca king, Tupac Yupanqui, meaning then that its function as an Inca temple covered less than 100 years before its destruction by the Spanish and then covered over by the colonial church. In the temple’s most inaccessible part, the Wiracocha, the Universe, as pictured by the Inca had been displayed. A model of what it may have depicted is on display, but again note that the Inca Universe” may not be precisely accurate since this was not written down until 1613. The 3^rd picture has an explanation in Spanish, Quechua, and Aymara.   

The Universe as perhaps viewed by the Inca

Close up

 

Explanation sign onsite with background glare

The pictures show the precise construction of the Inca, and during the severe 1950 earthquake in Cusco, the convent and church and so much else in Cusco was damaged or destroyed, but NOT what remained of the Inca construction. A former Inca could have read this as a sign that their god was still with here and not with the god of the Conquistadors.

Cusco has other examples of finely-cut Inca walls

Several Calvin students wanted to have their picture taken with this stone.

Note all the angles yet how it was finely laid. No knife could go between the courses.

Paz y Shalom, Neal Bierling