
Last modified: 2021-07-03 by rob raeside
Keywords: cusco | cuzco | qusqu | qosqo | rainbow flag | 
Links: FOTW homepage |
search | 
disclaimer and copyright | 
write us | 
mirrors
 image by Ivan  Sache, 4 June 2021
image by Ivan  Sache, 4 June 2021The Council of the Cusco 
Provincial Municipality unanimously approved on 4 June 2021 Ordinance No. 8 
prescribing the addition of the municipal emblem, the Echenique Sun, to the 
"rainbow" flag hitherto used by the town.
https://andina.pe/agencia/noticia-cusco-aprueba-ordenanza-incluye-sol-echenique-su-estandarte-oficial-847945.aspx
Andina, 4 June 2021
Ivan Sache, 4 June 2021
 image by Jan-Patrick Fischer and António Martins, 
	02 September 2001
image by Jan-Patrick Fischer and António Martins, 
	02 September 2001
A 7-stripped rainbow flag: 
red - orange - yellow - green - light blue - dark blue - purple.
António Martins, 02 September 2001
The "rainbow" flag was adopted on 9 June 1978 but had been used 
unofficially since the 1970s. The design was originally pushed by Radio 
Tawantinsuyo as a traditional Inca flag.
Photos
https://laprimera.pe/regidora-de-25-anos-se-convierte-en-alcaldesa-encargada-del-cusco/ 
https://larepublica.pe/politica/2020/09/04/romi-infantas-la-alcaldesa-mas-joven-del-peru-apunta-a-reflotar-la-economia-de-cusco-en-plena-pandemia-lrsd/ 
https://cusco.gob.pe/alcaldia/alcalde-del-cusco/ 
https://fullday.pe/historia-de-la-bandera-del-cuzco/ 
https://www.facebook.com/LenguaAprista/posts/1672862286200350/ 
https://www.boletomachupicchu.com/cusco-o-cuzco/ 
https://www.salkantaytrekking.com/blog/surprised-by-the-cusco-flag-here-well-tell-you-its-true-story 
The municipal emblem is prescribed by Decree no. 63 issued on 23 June 1986 
by the Municipal Council. The Echenique Plaque was used by the chief of the Inca 
Empire, self-styled the son of the sun. Rebel Túpac Amaru II (1736-1781) wore it 
as the symbol of his power.
The emblem represents a solar calendar featuring 
representations of Wiracocha (the great creator deity), kay pacha (the 
perceptible world), ukhu pacha (the inner world), and hanan pacha (the upper 
realm).
https://www.simbolospatrios.org.pe/2018/04/departamento-de-cusco.html 
Símbolos Patrios del Perú
By the mid-19th century “the display of 
antiquities in parlors and salons was confined to the highest strata of Lima 
society,” she writes. “To own and to display antiquities, to bring them out and 
show them to one’s guests after dinner, appears to have constituted an element 
of elite sociability in the city of Lima.”
It was during one such evening on 
October 25, 1853, that English geographer, explorer, and writer Clements R. 
Markham attended a dinner party graced with the presence of Peruvian President 
José Rufino Echenique (1808-1887; in office, 1851-1855).
“Echenique ‘very 
good-naturedly brought with him some golden ornaments of the Inca period, 
recently arrived from Cuzco’, among them a breastplate ‘worn by the Inca’, ‘the 
head of an ornamental pin or topu, worn by the coya or wife of the Inca’, and 
three flat pieces of gold, which Markham explained represented ‘the leaves out 
of the Golden Garden of the Incas.'”
[...]
Seven years later, Markham’s 
contemporary, William Bollaert, a writer, chemist, geographer, and ethnologist, 
interpreted the sketch, declaring the relic to possibly be “an incarial lunar 
calendar or a zodiac.”
After President Echenique’s death, his daughter sold 
the piece in 1912 to Dr. Eduard Gaffron, a German ophthalmologist and 
antiquities dealer who came to Lima in 1892. He in turn sold it a year later to 
George Gustav Heye, the collector of Native American artifacts, whose collection 
became the core of the National Museum of the American Indian.
https://www.fertur-travel.com/blog/2017/the-inca-sun-of-suns-could-be-returned-to-cusco-by-donald-trump/13191/ 
Fertur Peru Travel Blog, 21 September 2017 
Ivan Sache, 4 June 2021
I found a coat of arms of Cuzco in the Internet, but everywhere in the 
city and department is this golden Inca-symbol and the rainbow flag in use, 
even on official buildings. Only on old monuments I could find this coat of 
arms. On every modern official building, only the golden Inca symbol is used. 
I only saw the old arms at the wall of old churches, carved in the stone.
Jan-Patrick Fischer, 11 April 2001 and 08 September 2001
The emblem mentioned by Jan-Patrick seems to be the Cusco “coat of arms”, 
according to the Spanish Wikipedia 
article.
António Martins, 19 September 2007
At the boleto turístico, you can find the 
golden symbol with 
the rainbow flag like a seal. It is the only time 
I saw this two symbols connected.
Jan-Patrick Fischer, 08 September 2001