The Coricancha or the actual spelling Koricancha translates to golden temple. Today it is located where the convent of Santo Domingo is located in the city of Cusco. This place is perhaps the most sacred place out of all the places from the Incan time period. They came here to worship Inti, the sun god, the highest god of the entire Inca Empire. Since this place was so sacred you had to publicly humiliate yourself. You had to fast, walk barefoot, and add some weight or a lump to you back when you went in there. This requirement was made by the oldest priest, Wilaq Umu.
This building is magnificently built. The y bricks that hold it together are placed so precise and polished so well that you can barely fit a razor blade in between two bricks. The cross sections are clasped together with H shaped bronze clamps. It is designed where the bigger bricks are on the bottom and the smaller ones are on top. It is also designed like trapezoid with the longer pieces on bottom and the shorter ones on the top. This precision is amazing for a group that ruled during the late 1300’s and early 1400’s. Sometimes I want to believe that they had better buildings than us. They built so that it could stand most earthquakes. It is unfortunately a building and was damaged by bigger earthquakes.
The construction of this building is very elaborate in some spots. The façade of the temple was made of an elaborate wall of the finest stonework. The wall was decorated with a greatly finished band of gold that was about the width of a hand palm. The ceiling was made of delicately cut straw. Since then the structure of the temple has been modified. The first modification happened after the Spanish conquest. They built on the temple what today is known as the convent of Holy Sunday-Santo Domingo. The other modification happened after the earthquake in 1950.
The Coricancha is not only a building but also a plaza too. It is surrounded be an amazing stone wall made in the peak of its time. The Santo-Domingo was built pretty much on it but didn’t ruin it. It sits next to it and adds the building. The old architecture of stone walls and buildings next to some little more modern buildings is great. To top it off it has a high tower the peaks over the Santo Domingo. Another thing that the Inca’s were good at was hydro-engineering and also channeling water. Today Coricancha just lights up and shows off its beauty in Cusco.
The main gate faced toward Northeast; which is almost the same position of Santo Domingo today. This overlooks the plaza in front, Sun Plaza, which has a small park in the front. Every year on the winter solstice there is a big festival that happens. In the days and weeks before it you can find children and adults practicing Native dances. Even though it is present day the people still must do all their practices bare footed.
http://www.globalexpresstours.com/english/country-peru/places/getting-to-know-the-koricancha.html
http://www.kathyamen.net/peru/ccori.htm
http://www.infoperu.com/peru/eng/inca/corichancha.html
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