Lord of Huanca Festivity

September 6th, 2006

Since the 19th century, the Sanctuary of Huanca, located in the Pachatusán mountain, province of Calca, district of San Salvador (50km from Cusco city), is one of the most important destinations for pilgrims in South America. Every year on September 14, thousands of devotees, not only Peruvian but also Bolivian, Argentinean and Chilean, go to the Sanctuary of Huanca to receive the blessing of the Lord.

History tells that in 1675 God appeared to a humble miner named Diego Quispe, who was hiding in a cave after escaping from the Yasos mine, where he suffered slavery-like work conditions. The priests of Our Lady of Mercy in Cusco heard the occurrence, and sent an artist from the famous Cusco School to paint an image of the Lord at the site where he had appeared. The lord of Huanca was painted on a rock, around which the main altar was built.

Along the way to the sanctuary, nestled half way up the mountain, numerous vendors sell religious items and desires in miniature -toy houses, cars, trucks, legal papers-, for the devotees to place at the base of the Lord’s image. Alcoholic beverages are absent from the festivity, quite remarkable if we consider that alcohol plays an important role in most other Andean festivities, both pagan and religious. It is said that Lord of Huanca disapproves of all alcohol and has overturned trucks and buses carrying those who drink.

Like most pilgrimage sites in the central Andes, the Lord of Huanca is fused with the sacred, living power of the mountain, upon which he focuses his miraculous healing powers.

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