The reading of llama entrails to predict the future
was a common practice in Inca times. Guaman
Poma de Ayala, Felipe. El primer nueva corónica
y buen gobierno. Edited by John V. Murra and
Rolena Adorno, 826/880. Mexico City: Siglo
Veintiuno, 1980 [1615].The Incas also observed celestial bodies and constellations, in particular the
Pleiades, called Collca (storehouse; see Astronomy). The intensity of the
constellation’s luminosity in the June sky was believed to be directly
proportional to the amount of future harvests. People considered some celestial
phenomena such as rainbows, solar or lunar eclipses, and the passage of comets
to be evil omens. Inca astrologists interpreted solar eclipses as harbingers of a
death in the royal family. In order to ward off the ill-fated presage, they made
offerings and sacrificed children to the Sun god. The chronicler Garcilaso de la
Vega states that during lunar eclipses, believed to signal the beginning of the