Inti

What it is

Inti is the Quechua word for the sun, and the name of the Inca sun deity. The word itself came into Quechua from Puquina, which explains why unrelated languages, Quechua, Aymara and Mapuche among them, all have similar terms for the sun. The Inca state took Inti as its patron, and Pachacuti is often credited with spreading the cult. Writers usually call him a sun god, but it is closer to a cluster of solar faces. He is also counted among creator deities, born in the commonest telling from Viracocha.

Legends and lineage

In the stories, Inti and his sister Mama Quilla, the moon, are kindly powers, and she bore him children. The Rainbow, the Pleiades and Venus serve at their court. Manco Cápac, the ancestor who founded the Inca line, is called Inti's son in one account, though another makes him a son of Viracocha. A third story gives Inti different parents: Pachamama, the earth, and the sky god, whom he later follows as her second husband. Inti told his children to settle where a golden bar they carried sank into the ground, and the Inca said this place was Cusco. Later rulers were held to be Inti's living stand-ins.

Temples and priesthood

The chief temple of the state religion was the Qurikancha in Cusco, where wall niches held the bodies of earlier emperors and statues of Inti were brought out at some festivals. Major provinces each had a sun temple of their own, served by priests and by the mamakuna, women chosen from the aqllakuna, the chosen women, who wove special cloth and brewed chicha for the god's feasts and offerings. The Willaq Umu, high priest of the sun, stood second in the kingdom, often a brother of the Sapa Inca. Archaeological evidence for offerings includes prayers, food, coca leaves, woven cloth, animals, blood and human beings.

The festival of Inti Raymi

Inti Raymi means sun festival. It began as a marking of the new planting season and was kept at the southern winter solstice, the year's shortest day, near 24 June. The four parts of Tawantinsuyu attended. Officers, captains and their people came in their best clothes and brought their finest weapons and instruments. A fast of three days came first, with no fires lit and no sexual relations. The festival then ran nine days of heavy eating and drinking, and all the sacrifices were made on the first day. Everyone left afterwards with the Inca's permission. It still draws crowds to Cusco.

The sun today

Sun imagery outlived the empire that used it. It appears on the coat of arms of Bolivia and of Ecuador, on the flag of the Hispanic people and on an older flag of Peru. Peru's highest honour, the Order of the Sun, carries the same association. Northern Chile and parts of north-eastern and Cuyo Argentina also lay inside Inca lands, so the motif reaches there as well. Not all of this is a direct link to Inti as a god; it shows how long the sun has carried meaning in the Andes, through conquest and after it. At Tiwanaku, some read the central figure of the Sun Gate as Inti, others as Viracocha, and the sun there is one creation among many.

How Inti is kept

The state set aside a share of land and herds in every conquered province for Inti, and each province had a sun temple. Priests served there, and the mamakuna, chosen women, wove cloth and brewed chicha for the god's feasts and offerings. At the solstice the mamakuna kept a fast, hoping to share the sun's sorrow. People brought prayers, food, coca leaves, cloth and animals; blood and human lives were offered as well. For Inti Raymi the order ran: three days without fires or sex, then nine days of feasting, with every sacrifice made on the first day.

When and where

Inti Raymi was fixed to the southern winter solstice, the shortest day, which fell near 24 June. Ceremonies for the sun ran at other times too, and images of Inti were carried out of the Qurikancha on certain festivals. In Cusco the June festival is still staged each year.

The worship was strongest in the highlands, where maize and other grains depended on the sun. Cusco, the Inca capital, held the chief temple, the Qurikancha, and remains the home of Inti Raymi. Sun temples stood in the major provinces of the empire, and sun symbols survive on state emblems in Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru, and in northern Chile and western Argentina.

What Inti means

The sun mattered before the Inca ruled, because farming in the Andes fails without steady light and warmth, and because the sun's heat was thought to bring rain. For the Inca the ruler stood for Inti on earth, so honouring the sun honoured the state and its ancestor line. Inti Wawqi, the brother face, was tied to the founding of Inca kingship and to the cult of dead rulers. Divine kingship and devotion to the sun grew together, which some scholars read as religion put to political use.

Days Inti is marked

Questions people ask about Inti

See also

NgillatunA communal Mapuche rite of prayer, sacrifice and dance to maintain cosmic balanceKaddishA Jewish hymn of sanctification recited during prayer services and mourning rituals.Armenian Genocide Remembrance DayAn annual day of mourning and remembrance for the victims of the 1915 Armenian Genocide.Qoyllur Rit'iAn Andean mountain pilgrimage uniting indigenous star lore and Catholic devotion

Good reading and sources

• Encyclopaedia BritannicaArticle
• Why the Incas offered up child sacrificesThe Guardian, Article
• Why the Incas offered up child sacrificesThe Guardian, Article

• Inti on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.