As we climbed the steps out of the cellar "classroom", we felt so privileged and enlightened to have been given such an interesting visit in this special hacienda in Cusco. We entered the sunny courtyard and spent some time enjoying the fresh air of this high altitude land, the beautiful views and a cute cat that wanted to be befriended. Then again we were surprised when our host introduced us to her father, a retired professor from the university. He invited us into his private Andean museum which is housed in a restored stone building in the back garden of La Casona.
The museum is displayed in a huge rectangular room with very high ceilings. The walls were decorated with all kinds of historical artefacts and educational charts about Andean ways of life. Displayed around the perimeter of the walls, above the picture-rail height, was a history time line dating from early BC times to the 20th century. Other charts included: the Inca calendar, Diagrams of Incan agricultural practises, Sketches of how to terrace a mountainside in order to grow crops, Labelled South American animal drawings, Dwelling construction plans and instructions, Names of the many varieties of corn and potatoes grown in Cusco.
We spent the rest of our visit, learning from this learned and kind professor who'd set up this museum of charts and artefacts to assist locals and international visitors in understanding and appreciate Andean culture. He explained the Inca calendar to us in great detail and enthusiastically pointed to significant features on the chart. It was fascinating and he answered questions readily. We learnt that the Inca people actually had two calendars which were based on observations of the sun and moon and their relationship to the stars.
The solar or day time calendar was very important to Inca people, since they depend on this to fix the days on planting. They built four towers on the horizons east and west of Cusco to mark the rising and setting locations of the sun in August. By looking at the towers from certain location points in the main plaza of Cusco, they'd check which day the sun rose over the eastern tower and set on the western tower, thus indicating the day for planting corn and potatoes. When the sun rose between the towers it marked the day of general sowing. The lunar or night time calendar days were associated important ceremonies to the moon and stars which were sacred deities of the Incas.
The Incas' daytime calendar based on the solar cycle, was approximately 365 days long, whilst their night time calendar had only 328 days but this anomaly was not important to the Incas because the they did not associate equal periods of time with each month; rather, they recorded the passage of the year in terms of the activities and ceremonies required of the gods at different times. Therefore the correlation of the Inca's calendars with the modern one is only approximate.
Another interesting display was the samples of the different types of corn and potatoes that are grown in Cusco. Peru grows 600 different types of potatoes and 120 varieties of corn with an assemblage of shapes, sizes and colourings. Some of these were displayed and labelled on a long central table. We had eaten some of the corn varieties at breakfast earlier in the day and they were plump, soft and sweet. The display of potato varieties was interesting but blue potatoes left us gob-smacked and red and purple corn cobs were a total surprise to our eyes. Wow! What a great imagination our creator God has – and we are still surprised by the wonders of his design.
Finally it was time to leave La Casona and continue exploring more of Cusco. We thanked our professor and host and headed for our coach. It was now about 1.30pm and we still had the markets, a llama village farm and an Inca fort to visit but somewhere in between we were going to stop for lunch.
My, what a lot has been packed into this day so far!
