CHAPTER IX
THE INCA CALENDAR, FESTIVALS, AND DRESS OF THE SOVEREIGN AND HIS QUEEN
Religion, in its ritual and ceremonial observances, was dependent on the annual recurrence of agricultural events such as the preparation of the land, sowing, and harvest, and both were dependent on the calendar. In the records of the old kings the gradual improvements in calculating the coming and going of the seasons are recorded, and under the Incas a certain approach to accuracy had been attained. The solstices and equinoxes were carefully observed.
Stone pillars were erected, eight on the east and eight on the west side of Cuzco, to observe the solstices. They were in double rows, four and four, two low between two high ones, twenty feet apart. At the heads of the pillars there were discs for the sun's rays to enter. Marks were made on the ground, which had been levelled and paved. Lines were drawn to mark the movements of the sun, as shown when its rays entered the holes in the pillars. The pillars were called Sucanca, from Suca, a ridge or furrow, the alternate lights and shades appearing like furrows.
