Set on the day of the Southern Hemisphere's Winter Solstice, the festival of Inti Raymi is held on the plain in front of the looming fortress-city of Sacsayhuamán in Cuzco. The festival pays homage to the mythical Inca ancestral gods and is dedicated to the remembrance of the cultural origins of the Inca civilisation.

Literally translated, Inti Raymi means the solemn resurrection of the sun. According to Inca legend the sun-god, Inti, was the life-giving source and natural father to the first Incas, Manco Capac and his sister, Coya Mama Oclla Huaco, and through them of the ruling dynasties of the Inca kings and subjects of the Inca empire. The ceremonies at the heart of the festival were realised in recognition of the sun as the highest of all entities and the source of all human life.

Under the Inca empire the festival lasted nine days and featured sacrifices, protracted drinking rituals, dancing and inexhaustible feasts. Governors, military staff and vassalage from all over an empire which spanned what is now Peru, Ecuador and parts of Chile, Argentina and Bolivia, gathered at the Inca capital to bear testimony to the most important rites of the year.