Page:Myths of Mexico and Peru.djvu/399

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HISTORICAL SKETCH OF INCAN PERUVIANS

much character that we are forced to conclude that they are veritable portraits. Fine stone dishes are often found, as well as platters of wood, and these frequently bear as ornament tasteful carvings representing serpents. On several cups and vases are painted representations of battles between the Inca forces and the savages of the eastern forests using bows and arrows; below wander the animals of the forest region, a brightly painted group.

The Archaeological Museum of Madrid gives a representation of very varied kinds of Peruvian pottery, including some specimens modelled upon a series of plants, interesting to botanists. The Louvre collections have one or two interesting examples of earthenware, as well as the Ethnographical Museum of St. Petersburg, and in all these collections there are types which are believed to be peculiar to the Old World.

The Trocadero Museum has a very curious specimen with two necks called the "Salvador." A drawing on the vase represents a man with a tomahawk. The Peruvians, like the Mexicans, also made musical instruments out of earthenware, and heavy ornaments, principally for the ear.

Historical Sketch of the Incan Peruvians

The Inca dominion, as the Spaniards found it, was instituted only about a century before the coming of the white man. Before that time Inca sway held good over scattered portions of the country, but had not extended over the entire territory which in later times was connected with the Inca name. That it was founded on the wreck of a more ancient power which once existed in the district of Chinchay-suyu there can be little doubt. This power was wielded over a space bounded by the lake of Chinchay-cocha on the north and Abancay on the south, and extended to the Pacific

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