¡Haylli Qosqo! ¡Happy day Cusco!

On the esplanade of Sacsayhuamán, the Inca festival of Inti Raymi is celebrated every June 24, a religious ceremony that the men of the empire dedicated to the sun. Today the party is held in three Inca settings. The Qoricancha or Santo Domingo church, Cusco or Huacaypata Main Square and on the esplanade of the Sacsayhuaman fortress.

The heralds announce, with the music of their pututus, the arrival of the Inca to the Festival of the Sun. The celebration coincides with the winter solstice, a key date for agricultural production in Inca times.

(Inti Rayimi, guerrero tocando el pututu)

Girls, dressed in the clothes of the Inca virgins, attend the Inti Raymi parties.

Spanish chroniclers have left us numerous accounts of the delight that surrounded the monarch. The subjects could not approach the Son of the Sun without carrying a load on their heads, as a sign of submission.

Inca social organization was based on a hierarchy. The family of the Inca nobility constituted the dominant caste (called the dried apricots). Under them was the mass of the people (hatun runa) and the yanaconas (outcasts devoid of all rights).

On the occasion of the Inti Raymi, we attend a picturesque reconstruction of the dances and rites of the ancient Inca empire every year to celebrate the Sun god, hence the meaning of his name Inti: Sun, Raymi: Party.

These and many more parties will be given in the coming months.