The Amazonian myths collected among certain Panoan-speaking peoples which make reference to the Inca figure have generally been subject to one of two interpretations. They are either seen to recall a remote past in which these peoples may have been ruled by Quechua aristocrats or they are seen to be structural aspects of identity or cosmology, in which the Inca would be representative of the White man or of some celestial alterity. These interpretations, in spite of their heuristic value, serve to limit our understanding of structural and historical aspects of the Pano Inca. This article proposes that we also try to understand the Pano Inca as an effective symbol, related to social and/or artistic models with their own distinctive values: people such as the Shipibo-Conibo and the Kaxinawa have shaped around this figure a tradition which sets them apart from the neighbouring Nawa groups.
