The Quechua and Aymara Indians of the Andes mountains are the largest group of Indians still existent in the New World. Approximately 28 million Indians and mestizos (persons of mixed Spanish and Indian descent) live along the Pacific coast and in the Andean highlands. About one-fourth of these Indians live and speak as they did before the Spanish conquest in the sixteenth century. Six million speak Quechua and approximately 1 million speak Aymara. For the purposes of this article, the religious systems of both the Quechua and the Aymara will be treated together, and both groups will be referred to, collectively, as "Andeans."

Although some Andeans have moved to large urban centers, such as La Paz, Bolivia, and Lima, Peru, the majority live in small communities (from twenty to five hundred families) scattered throughout the Andes, with a population density of three...