In the time of the Incas, we are told, there was a high god, or a supreme energy who was known as Wiraqocha commonly although he was also called Tiqsi Wiraqocha. This latter means God the Creator of the Universe. Other people called this same figure Apu Kon Tiqsi Wiraqocha Pacha Yachachi. When translated literally, this latter means Divine Foce who Teaches the Fundament of Creative Energy Accumulated in the Lake of Time.
He was represented in an oval shape, that is an egg shape, as the Quechua chronicler Pachakuti Salcamayhua represents him in his chronicle. He stands at the center of the visual scheme laid out by the early colonial author.
We do not only have that chronicle to sustain that Wiraqocha took the form of an egg which represented life. In the Cathedral, which was the great temple of Wiraqocha, we also have something important that supports this idea. According to chroniclers such as Garcilaso de la Vega, there was an Usnu or ceremonial altar (mesa) dedicated especially to this supreme being. However with the coming of the Spanish, the majority of the Inca palaces and temples were destroyed or reutilized to make European-style palaces.
The great Cathedral or the Basilica of the Cathedral was built right on top of the temple of Wiraqocha, just as the Catholic religion was superposed on our Andean ways. With the passage of time, the colonized Andeans were supposed to be governed ever more by Catholicism. In the construction of the Cathedral the Spanish demolished most of what was already there on this part of the great Plaza de Armas. Only one piece of evidence remains of what was this important sanctuary. In one of the corners of the Cathedral, on the left side of the main door, called the Gate of Forgiveness, you find a stone called hiwaya that is egg shaped and represents Illa Teqsi Wiraqocha.
Not many people are aware of the existence of this tangible representation of Wiraqocha. Those who are, visit it and pray to it by extending their hands towards it to receive the energy that it emits.
There probably were other objects that may have stood for Wiraqoche or given us more detail about how people understood him. But we must take into account that time, the prohibitions of the clergy around exercising a belief that diverged from Catholicism, and so on had the effect of much being lost. Many valuable things are lost to us.
