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Qollahuaya‐Andean Body Concepts: A Topographical‐Hydraulic Model of Physiology
Author(s) -
Bastien Joseph W.
Publication year - 1985
Publication title -
american anthropologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.51
H-Index - 85
eISSN - 1548-1433
pISSN - 0002-7294
DOI - 10.1525/aa.1985.87.3.02a00050
Subject(s) - citation , library science , art history , anthropology , sociology , computer science , history
Ritual, pathological, and ethnopharmacological data indicate that Qollahuaya Andeans have a topographical-hydraulic model for understanding thephysiology of their bodies. Qollahuayas look to their ayllu, a mountain with three ecological levels, and its waterways for understanding their physiology. Analogously, Qollahuayas understand the body as a vertically layered axis with a system of ducts through which air, blood, fat, and water flow to and from the sonco (heart). Blood and fat, principles of life and energy, come together at the heart and flow to the members of the body in a hydraulic cycle of centripetal and centrifugal motion. The sonco is also a distillation center that combines respiratory, digestive, and reproductive functions. Within this distillation process, secondary fluids (bile, feces, gas, milk, phlegm, semen, sweat, and urine) are produced that need to be eliminated. If these fluids accumulate, they become noxious and must be purgedfrom the body with carminatives, emetics, enemas,fastings, dietary restrictions, and baths. Basically, the body is a hydraulic system with distillation, circulation, and elimination processes, which operate by the centripetal and centrifugal forces of liquids.