scheme of
government was imposed upon the inhabitants of Peru by the foreign
chieftains is best proven by the following passages from the Rites and
Laws of the Incas (p. 77) and Garcilaso de la Vega (pp. 9 and 10). "With a
view that each tribe should be clearly distinguishable and after assigning
a different costume to each they were ordered to choose their respective
pacariscas, a word meaning, literally, their birth and origin. They were
told to choose for themselves whence they were descended and whence they
came, and as the Indians were generally very dull and stupid, some chose
to assign their origin to a lake, others to a spring, others a rock,
others a hill or ravine. But every lineage chose some object for its
pacarisca. Some tribes [subsequently] adored eagles because they boasted
to have descended from them ... others adored fountains, rivers, the
earth, which they call Mother, or air, fire, ... snow-mountains, maize,
the sea, named mother-sea."

According to Garcilaso de la Vega "the Peruvian tribes subsequently
invented an infinity of fables concerning the origin of their different
ancestors.... An Indian does not consider himself honorable unless he can
trace his descent from a river, fountain, lake or the sea, or from some
wild beast like the bear, puma, ocelot, eagle, etc." An example of a
certain amount of vain-glory was indeed set by the diplomatic Inca himself
who claimed, for himself and lineage, descent from the Sun and reserved
burnished gold ornaments for his particular use. His successors
subsequently built a temple of the Sun at Cuzco and set up its image made
of gold and precious stones. Around this, the royal "pacarisca," they
placed the mummies of all the dead Incas. In another room there was an
image of "the moon, with a woman's face," and about it were the mummies of
the royal women. From this we learn that the latter assigned their origin
to the moon and that it was their pacarisca or huaca. As an illustration
of the way in which creation-myths are sometimes evolved from actual
occurrences, it is interesting to study another account of the mode in
which tribal regulations were introduced into Peru. Owing, most probably,
to the fact that one of the titles given to the Creator was "the Teacher,"
we find Molina attributing to the Creator himself the establishment of the
tribal system and the assignment of totems and different costumes to each
group or family. If we read his account and, with Ga