With two kilometers of the town of Cuzco is the ruins of a fortress, Sacsayhuamán in quechua, INCA.

Built at the origin with a defensive aim, the fortress is to 3700 m of altitude. It with the shape of a head of puma, animal crowned in INCA cosmology.

Structure

This immense fortress, was set up on the initiative of the INCA Pachacutec and on the plans of its architect Huallpa Rimachi. Work was continued under the reign of Tupac Yupanqui, and perhaps completed under that of Huayna Capac. It is estimated that more than 20.000 men worked during 50 years with its construction.

It is made up of three long parallel ramparts 600 m, laid out in zigzag, which consist of monolithic blocks, (largest 9 m in height, 5 m broad measure and 4 m thickness, for a weight of approximately 350 tons) perfectly assembled and embedded one in another. The technique used to transport and assemble such masses remains a mystery. The enclosures, which are about 360 m long, are connected by staircases and trapezoidal doors. In 1533, the Spanish chronicler Sancho Pedro of Hoz wrote about it:

In all the country, you will not find walls also splendid. They are made up of so large stones, that nobody can believe that they were brought there by human beings… Neither the aqueduct of Segovia, nor no other construction carried out by Hercules or the Romans can be compared with this one… .

The fortress was furnished with three turns of which there remain the foundations:

• the round tower of Muyomarca sheltered the INCA and its court for the periods of meditation and fast.
• That of Paucamarca had a religious function and was dedicated to the sun-worship. Its base on the ground consists of a stone circle of a dozen meters in diameter and of a star structure whose significance is not cleared up. According to the legend, it was connected to the Temple of the Sun by a network of underground galleries.

• That of Sullamarca was reserved for the garrison and sheltered deposits of food, weapons and clothing.

History

Under the walls of Sacsayhuaman one of the last episodes of the conquest of Peru was played. In 1536, during the rising of Manco INCA, the Spaniards who held the center of Cuzco were attacked of all shares by thousands of soldiers incas. They succeeded in of accuracy preserving their positions and tried to loosen the vice by a counter-attack on Sacsayhuaman which showed a failure: Juan Pizarro (young person of the four brothers) there was mortally wounded.

The battle gave place to the heroic episode of the captain INCA Cahuide, passed to the posterity: whereas the Spaniards attacked the tower where it had been cut off with several warriors, it preferred to jump in the vacuum and went to be crushed with the foot of this one rather than to go. The head office of Sacsayhuaman was reported by an eyewitness of the battle, Pedro Pizarro (the cousin of the four brothers), in her chronicle Relacion LED descubrimiento there conquista del Peru, written in 1571.

Inti Raymi

Each year, the June 24th, is celebrated the Inti Raymi, the festival of the sun. It is the day of the Winter solstice in the southern hemisphere, day when the sun is furthest away from the ground. Admirers of the sun and astronomers highly skilled, Incas carried out incantations so that it returns.

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