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In Tawantinsuyu, Incan society had a seven day week. The days could be enumerated as following:

Monday:    AWAKI puncha
Tuesday:   AWKARIK puncha
Wednesday: CHILLAY puncha
Thursday:  KULLKA puncha
Friday:    CHASKA puncha
Saturday:  WACHA puncha
Sunday:    INTI puncha

source

(please note: small/subtle differences could exist among different dialects, but roughly every kichwa / quichua / quechua / qechua / runasimi dialect has these days pronounced equally).

The only day I care about is the last: INTI puncha (or punchaw, punchay, p'achay...), which stands for sun's day.

When I think about Europe as invaders in roughly 1500, I then see that by looking in references like this, or wikipedia, the seventh day was renamed domingo instead of dies solis in at much IV or V century.

Question: From where did Quichua-speaking people get the reference to the sun in the 7th day? Considering European people who reached the Inca empire had references to God instead of the sun for that day?

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    Traditionally Saturday is the seventh day of the week, but Europeans within the past century or so seem to have adopted a convention of treating Sunday as the seventh day.
    – Michael Hardy
    Mar 12, 2017 at 20:03
  • Why should the Inca and Europeans name days based on similar premises? Further, "Inti" stood for the Sun but the Sun was also their god, so there is a reference to the Incan god in that name.
    – gktscrk
    Dec 16, 2020 at 9:01
  • Yes, but Domingo comes from the same root of Domain. It is the Lord's day. Quichua people who had been reached by europeans acquired (forcibly) christian premises: They would not be allowed to keep Inti as a reference, but only minor gods or creatures. Case of study: Imbabura legends in Ecuador reference Supay (not the Devil but the incarnation of the Death - actually Supay is a generic term for "Spirit" in Ecuador), Jesus, Mary, and Tayta Imbabura (the spirit of a volcano after which the province itself is named). Inti is seldom to never named.
    – Luis Masuelli
    Dec 16, 2020 at 23:12
  • This means: those who kept the "original" names (which belong to certain zones - actually I learned few days ago that Ecuadorean quichua people used a different set of names, and that these names I wrote 4 years ago belong mostly to Bolivia) would have them prior to christianity, for christians would not allow them (in fact, they did not allow in schools! quichia people suffered a lot of discrimination if caught even talking in quichua) to keep non-christians references, even in a syncretic way.
    – Luis Masuelli
    Dec 16, 2020 at 23:18

1 Answer 1

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The reference for Inti puncha was related with the movement of the sun, Inti puncha is a meditation day, awaki puncha is a fertility day, awkarik is the day of the inner force, Cillay puncha is the day of action, Kullka puncha is a day of abundance, chaska puncha is a day where you can get good advice, wacha puncha is a day to be in home. Tinkunakuy 2020.

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