The legend would seem to indicate that he was supposed to have been defeated and quite driven away.  But the study of the monuments indicates that this was not the case.  One of the most remarkable antiquities in Peru is at a place called Concacha, three leagues south of Abancay, on the road from Cuzco to Lima.  M. Leonce Angrand has observed that this “was evidently one of the great religious centres of the primitive peoples of Peru.”  Here is found an enormous block of granite, very curiously carved to facilitate the dispersion of a liquid poured on its summit into varied streams and to quaint receptacles.  Whether the liquid was the blood of victims, the intoxicating beverage of the country, or pure water, all of which have been suggested, we do not positively know, but I am inclined to believe, with M. Wiener, that it was the last mentioned, and that it was as the beneficent deity of the rains that Con was worshiped at this sacred spot.  Its name con cacha, “the Messenger of Con,” points to this.[1]

[Footnote 1:  These remains are carefully described by Charles Wiener, Perou et Bolivie, p. 282, seq; from the notes of M. Angrand, by Desjardins, Le Perou avant la Conquete Espagnole, p. 132; and in a superficial manner by Squier, Peru, p. 555.]

The words Pacha camac mean “animating” or “giving life to the world.”  It is said by Father Acosta to have been one of the names of Viracocha,[1] and in a sacred song preserved by Garcilasso de la Vega he is appealed to by this title.[2] The identity of these two divinities seems, therefore, sufficiently established.

[Footnote 1:  Historia Natural y Moral de las Indias, Lib. v, cap. iii.]

[Footnote 2:  Comentarios Reales, Lib. ii, cap. xxviii.]

The worship of Pachacamac is asserted by competent antiquarian students to have been more extended in ancient Peru than the older historians supposed.  This is indicated by the many remains of temples which local tradition attribute to his worship, and by the customs of the natives.[1] For instance, at the birth of a child it was formally offered to him and his protection solicited.  On reaching some arduous height the toiling Indian would address a few words of thanks to Pachacamac; and the piles of stones, which were the simple signs of their gratitude, are still visible in all parts of the country.

[Footnote 1:  Von Tschudi, who in one part of his work maintains that sun-worship was the prevalent religion of Peru, modifies the assertion considerably in the following passage:  “El culto de Pachacamac se hallaba mucho mas extendido de lo que suponen los historiadores; y se puede sin error aventurar la opinion de que era la Deidad popular y acatada por las masas peruanas; mientras que la religion del Sol era la de la corte, culto que, por mas adoptado que fuese entre los Indios, nunca llego a desarraigar la fe y la devocion al Numen primitivo.  En effecto, en todas las relaciones de la vida de los Indios, resalta la profunda veneracion que tributavan a Pachacamac.” Antiguedades Peruanas, p. 149.  Inasmuch as elsewhere this author takes pains to show that the Incas discarded the worship of the Sun, and instituted in place of it that of Viracocha, the above would seem to diminish the sphere of Sun-worship very much.]