No. 178Mesoamerican & Andean Traditions

Pachamama

Pachamama · Mama Pacha

The living Mother Earth of the Andes, fed by those she feeds

Pachamama is the Andean Mother Earth, honoured by Quechua and Aymara families from Ecuador to northern Argentina. Her name joins pacha, a word covering world, place, soil and time, with mama, mother. Many describe her as the living ground beneath fields, herds and homes, not a character in tales.

People ask her permission and give thanks for the fields, herds and homes she sustains, and the bond runs on ayni, reciprocity: she feeds them, so they feed her. Before drinking, many pour a first sip onto the soil. On 1 August, Día de la Pachamama, and through the month, families and communities make a payment to the earth, called challa, corpachada or despacho, with produce, flowers, chicha and coca, then burn or bury it.

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Pachamama · Mama Pacha
No. 178

How to recognise Pachamama

  1. Three-peaked mountainIn the 1613 drawing by Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui, she is a mountain with three peaks, because Andean mountains are female and stand for Pachamama.
  2. Middle-world positionIn that drawing the mountain sits between the sky powers and the human world, showing the earth as the ground where people live.
  3. RiverA river or stream runs down from the peaks, showing the water that feeds the land.
  4. Lightning and rainbowPachacuti Yamqui draws lightning and a rainbow near her; they are details of his diagram, not required marks of her.
  5. Sun and moonIn the Coricancha diagram a sun (Inti) and a moon flank her as complementary male and female powers.
  6. Earth coloursRed-brown and ochre rock, green fields and blue water; the Cerro Rico of Potosí is reddish.
  7. Woman-and-mountain formIn the Virgen del Cerro (Potosí, c.1720, anonymous), the Virgin's red robe merges with the mountain and her head sits in its peak, an image some scholars read as linked to Pachamama, though it is a Marian painting and not a portrait of her.

Names and titles

  • Mother Earth, Mother WorldPacha means earth, world, place and time, and mama means mother
  • The Mountain MotherColonial Andean painters shaped her as a mountain, as in the Virgen del Cerro
  • First Sip for the EarthThe everyday ch'alla pours the first sip of a drink onto the ground for her
  • The Hungry Earth of AugustAugust is her month, when the earth is said to be open and hungry and offerings are made

Feast days

  • Día de la Pachamama (Pachamama Raymi)1 August, every year

    Día de la Pachamama, also called Pachamama Raymi, is the Andean feast of Mother Earth. Quechua and Aymara communities thank Pachamama and feed her. It opens a month of offerings that devotees keep through August.

    How it's celebrated. Families and communities dig a hole and place cooked food, coca leaves, seeds and drink in it. Many pour out the first drops of a drink in the challa. Many Andean communities also have a pako or yatiri lead the offering. Practice varies by place. In Cusco it is Hatun Willka Haywarikuy, and in northern Chile it is Qulqi Uru. Music and dance usually accompany it.

    Sources: Wikipedia (es): Día de la Pachamama · Noticias Ambientales: Pachamama Day rituals · Seibold: Misaq'epi y el despacho a la Pachamama del primero de agosto

Pachamama in the shop

Designs of Pachamama are being drawn: cute, vintage and a painted portrait.

Sources

  1. Britannica: Pachamama
  2. Wikipedia: Pachamama
  3. Gods and Monsters: Pachamama
  4. Wikipedia (Spanish): Día de la Pachamama
  5. Día Internacional: Día de la Pachamama
  6. Love Bolivia: Bolivian Traditions and Customs Guide
  7. Love Bolivia: Aymara People of Bolivia Guide
  8. Hispanic American Historical Review: The Virgin of the Andes (Duke University Press)
  9. Fordham University Vistas: Virgin of the Mountain of Potosí
  10. Judith Dobrzynski: Virgin of Cerro Rico
  11. Fordham University Vistas Gallery: Pachacuti Yamqui's Coricancha cosmogram
  12. ResearchGate: Detail of Joan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui's drawing of the altar
  13. Wikipedia: Pacha (Inca mythology)
  14. Revista Complutense (REAA): Pachamama in the Peruvian chronicles of the 16th and 17th centuries
  15. Center for Environmental Rights: Rights of Nature Law Library
  16. Dialogue Earth: Buen Vivir, a Manifesto for the Rights of Nature
  17. Wikipedia: Law of the Rights of Mother Earth
  18. Catholic World Report: Pope Francis apologizes over Amazon Synod statues
  19. National Catholic Register: Pope Francis apologizes over Amazon Synod statues
  20. Where Peter Is: Who Is Pachamama, Anyway?
  21. Academia.edu: Virgin Mary–Pachamama Syncretism in Early Colonial Copacabana
  22. Wikipedia: Pachamama Raymi
  23. EBSCO Research Starters: Pachamama
  24. Bolivian Life: Aymara, Quechua and Guaraní Cultures Guide
  25. New Internationalist: Bolivia's women mine workers
  26. Wanderlust: World Heritage Potosí, Bolivia
  27. Seibold (Redalyc): on q'epi cloths and the 1 August despacho
  28. Juan Polo de Ondegardo: Relaciones (1560s–1571)
  29. Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamaygua: Relación de antigüedades deste reyno del Pirú (c.1613)

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