Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/631

 RELIGIOUS DEDICATION OF WOMEN 015

of gold and silver, as in the temple of the Sun, because the virgins were looked

upon as his wives All things relating to them were in conformity with

the life and conversation of women who observed perpetual seclusion and virginity. There was a law for the nun who should transgress this rule of life, that she should be buried alive and that her accomplice should be strangled. But as it seemed to them but a slight punishment only to kill a man for so grave an offense as the violation of a woman dedicated to the Sun, his god, and the father of his Kings, the law directed that the wife, children, servants, and relations of the delinquent should be put to death, as well as all the inhabitants of his village and all their flock, without leaving a suckling nor a crying baby, as the saying is. The village was pulled down and the site strewn with stones, that the birthplace of so bad a son might forever remain desolate and accursed, where no man nor even beast might rest. This was the law, but it was never put into execution, because no man ever transgressed it."

The Sun or Inca clan was endogamous; for their great ancestor the Sun had married as his legitimate wife the Moon, his sister. His earth-wives or concubines were also

obliged to be of the same blood, that is to say, daughters of the Incas, either

of the King or of his relations, being free from all foreign blood They

gave as a reason for this that as they could only offer virgins for the service of the Sun, so it was likewise unlawful to offer a bastard with mixed foreign blood. For though they imagined that the Sun had children, they considered that they ought not to be bastards, with mixed divine and human blood."

The Inca, the lineal representative of the Sun-god, had also his houses of virgins. All things were the same in the Inca's houses as in the Sun's houses, except that women of all kinds were admitted into the former as long as they were virgins and very beautiful. 20 When the Inca asked for one, they selected

" Ibid., p. 298. " Ibid., p. 292.

" Polo de Ondegardo gives a rather different classification for the " devoted women." Part were sent to Cuzco for blood-sacrifice (this statement is significant for the hypothesis that living dedication was the outcome of blood-sacrifice), and part were secluded in women's houses. There were three kinds of houses : the Sun's, the Inca's, and the captains' and governors'. (Vol. XLVIII, pp. 165 if., " Hakluyt Society Works.")

In support of the hypothesis that blood-sacrifice of women to deity is analogous to widow-immolation is the fact that the latter as well as the former was practiced in Peru. " When an Inca or any great Curaca died, his favorite servants and

most beloved wives were buried alive with him or killed It is certain that

they themselves [wives] volunteered to be killed, and their number was often such that the officers were obliged to interfere, saying that enough had gone at