Editing Viracocha (section)

==Controversy over "White God"==
{{Further|Criollo people#Spanish colonial caste system}}
The first Spanish chroniclers from the 16th century made no mention of any identification with Viracocha. The first to do so was [[Pedro Cieza de León]] in 1553.<ref>''Colonial Spanish America: a documentary history'', Kenneth R. Mills, Rowman & Littlefield, 1998, p. 39.</ref> Similar accounts by Spanish chroniclers (e.g. [[Juan de Betanzos]]) describe Viracocha as a "white god", often with a beard.<ref>''Pre-Columbian America: Myths and Legends'', Donald. A. Mackenzie, Senate, 1996, p.268-270</ref> The whiteness of Viracocha is however not mentioned in the native authentic legends of the Incas and most modern scholars therefore had considered the "white god" story to be a post-conquest Spanish invention.<ref>Mills, 1998, p. 40.</ref>

[[File:MocheBeardedMen.jpg|right|thumb|Moche ceramic vessels depicting bearded men]]
Similarly to the [[Inca Empire|Incan]] god Viracocha, the [[Aztec]] god [[Quetzalcoatl]] and several other deities from Central and South American pantheons, like the [[Muisca people|Muisca]] god [[Bochica]] are described in legends as being bearded.<ref name="Siemens, William L 1979">Siemens, William L. "Viracocha as God and Hero in the Comentarios Reales." Hispanic Review 47, no. 3 (1979): 327–38. doi:10.2307/472790.</ref> The beard, once believed to be a mark of a prehistoric European influence and quickly fueled and embellished by spirits of the colonial era, had its single significance in the continentally insular culture of Mesoamerica. The ''Anales de Cuauhtitlan'' is a very important early source which is particularly valuable for having been originally written in Nahuatl. The ''Anales de Cuauhtitlan'' describes the attire of Quetzalcoatl at Tula:
{{Blockquote|Immediately he made him his green mask; he took red color with which he made the lips russet; he took yellow to make the facade; and he made the fangs; continuing, he made his beard of feathers...<ref>Anales de Cuauhtitlan., 1975, 9.)</ref>}}

In this quote the beard is represented as a dressing of feathers, fitting comfortably with academic impressions of Mesoamerican art. The story, however, does not mention whether Quetzalcoatl had facial hair or not with the point of outfitting him with a mask and symbolic feathered beard being to cover his unsightly appearance because as Quetzalcoatl said "If ever my subjects were to see me, they would run away!"<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://weber.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/nahuatl/ReadingQuetzalcoatl.html|title = Readings in Classical Nahuatl: The Death of Quetzalcoatl}}</ref>

While descriptions of Viracocha's physical appearance are open to interpretation, men with beards were frequently depicted by the Peruvian [[Moche culture]] in its famous pottery, long before the arrival of the Spanish.<ref>[http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/30203/Portrait_Vase_of_Bearded_Figure_Black Portrait Vase of Bearded Figure], Brooklyn Museum</ref> Modern advocates of theories such as a [[Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact theories|pre-Columbian European migration]] to Peru cite these bearded ceramics and Viracocha's beard as being evidence for an early presence of non-Amerindians in Peru.<ref>''In Quest of the Great White Gods'', Robert F. Marx, Crown Publishers, 1992 pp. 7–15.</ref> Although most Indians do not have heavy beards, there are groups reported to have included bearded individuals, such as the [[Aché people]] of [[Paraguay]], who also have light skin but who are not known to have any admixture with Europeans and Africans.<ref>{{cite book|last=Hill|first=Kim|title=Aché life history: the ecology and demography of a foraging people|year=1996|publisher=Aldine Transaction|isbn=978-0-202-02036-5|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_2ZQUncZuosC&q=light+skin|author2=A. Magdalena Hurtado |access-date=31 May 2011|page=58}}</ref> When the [[Southern Paiute]] were first contacted by Europeans in 1776, the report by fathers [[Silvestre Vélez de Escalante]] and [[Francisco Atanasio Domínguez]] noted that "Some of the men had thick beards and were thought to look more in appearance like Spanish men than native Americans".<ref name=DEJ>{{cite web|title=Dominquez and Escalante Expedition, 1776 |url=http://www.uintahbasintah.org/jdandemain.htm |publisher=UintahBasintah.org |access-date=2010-11-16}} cites: {{Citation |first1=A|last1=Chavez |last2=Waner |first2=T |year=1995 |title=The Dominguez and Escalante Journal|publisher=University of Utah Press |location=Salt Lake City}}|pages=187–193</ref>