Zoratama, also spelled as Soratama, was a Muisca woman and the lover of Spanish conquistador Lázaro Fonte. Her story reminds of the North American indigenous Pocahontas who married John Rolfe after saving the life of John Smith.
Muzo is a town and municipality in the Western Boyacá Province, part of the department of Boyacá, Colombia. It is widely known as the world capital of emeralds for the mines containing the world's highest quality gems of this type. Muzo is situated at a distance of 178 kilometres (111 mi) from the departmental capital Tunja and 118 kilometres (73 mi) from the capital of the Western Boyacá Province, Chiquinquirá. The urban centre is at an altitude of 815 metres (2,674 ft) above sea level. Muzo borders Otanche and San Pablo de Borbur in the north, Maripí and Coper in the east, Quípama in the west and the department of Cundinamarca in the south.
Tununguá is a town and municipality in Boyacá Department, Colombia, part of the subregion of the Western Boyacá Province. Tununguá is situated in the Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes at a relatively low altitude of 1,246 metres (4,088 ft). The municipality borders the department of Santander in the north and east and the Boyacá municipalities Pauna and Briceño (south).
The Yariguí people were an Indigenous Colombian tribe that gave their name to a mountainous area they once inhabited in the Andean cloud forest. It has been said that they committed mass suicide instead of submitting to Spanish colonial rule.
Motavita is a town and municipality in the Colombian Department of Boyacá, part of the subregion of the Central Boyacá Province. It covers approximately 62 square kilometres (24 sq mi).
Chivor is a town and municipality in the Eastern Boyacá Province, part of the Colombian department of Boyacá. The mean temperature of the village in the Tenza Valley is 18 °C (64 °F) and Chivor is located at 215 kilometres (134 mi) from the department capital Tunja. Economic activity includes emerald mining.
Fúquene is a municipality and town of Colombia in the department of Cundinamarca. The municipality borders Ubaté, Susa, Guachetá and the department of Boyacá. Fúquene is located 116 km northwest from the capital Bogotá.
The Spanish conquest of New Granada refers to the conquest by the Spanish monarchy of the Chibcha language-speaking nations of modern-day Colombia and Panama, mainly the Muisca and Tairona that inhabited present-day Colombia, beginning the Spanish colonization of the Americas. It is estimated that around 5 to 8 million people died as a result of Spanish Conquest, either by disease or direct conflict, this is roughly around 80-90% of the Pre-Columbian population of Colombia.
Emeralds are green and sometime green with a blueish-tint precious gemstones that are mined in various geological settings. They are minerals in the beryl group of silicates. For more than 4,000 years, emeralds have been among the most valuable of all jewels. Colombia, located in northern South America, is the country that mines and produces the most emeralds for the global market, as well as the most desirable. It is estimated that Colombia accounts for 70–90% of the world's emerald market. While commercial grade emeralds are quite plentiful, fine and extra fine quality emeralds are extremely rare. Colombian emeralds over 50 carat can cost much more than diamonds of the same size.
Knowledge of Muisca mythology has come from Muisca scholars Javier Ocampo López, Pedro Simón, Lucas Fernández de Piedrahita, Juan de Castellanos and conquistador Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada who was the European making first contact with the Muisca in the 1530s.
The Muisca Confederation was a loose confederation of different Muisca rulers in the central Andean highlands of what is today Colombia before the Spanish conquest of northern South America. The area, presently called Altiplano Cundiboyacense, comprised the current departments of Boyacá, Cundinamarca and minor parts of Santander.
Tundama or Saymoso was a cacique of the Muisca Confederation, a loose confederation of different rulers of the Muisca who inhabited the central highlands of the Colombian Andes. The city of Tundama, currently known as Duitama and part of the Tundama Province, Boyacá, were named after the cacique. Tundama ruled over the northernmost territories of the Muisca, submitted last by the Spanish conquistadores.
The Panche or Tolima is an indigenous group of people that lived in what is now Colombia. Their language is unclassified – and possibly unclassifiable – but may have been Cariban. They inhabited the southwestern parts of the department of Cundinamarca and the northeastern areas of the department of Tolima, close to the Magdalena River. At the time of the Spanish conquest, more than 30,000 Panche were living in what would become the New Kingdom of Granada. Early knowledge about the Panche has been compiled by scholar Pedro Simón. According to the latter, the word panche in their own Panche language means "cruel" and "murderer".
The Muisca inhabited the Altiplano Cundiboyacense in the Colombian Andes before the arrival of the Spanish and were an advanced civilisation. They mummified the higher social class members of their society, mainly the zipas, zaques, caciques, priests and their families. The mummies would be placed in caves or in dedicated houses ("mausoleums") and were not buried.
This article describes the economy of the Muisca. The Muisca were the original inhabitants of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, the high plateau in the Eastern Ranges of central present-day Colombia. Their rich economy and advanced merchant abilities were widely known by the indigenous groups of the area and described by the Spanish conquistadores whose primary objective was the acquisition of the mineral resources of Tierra Firme; gold, emeralds, carbon, silver and copper.
The Spanish conquest of the Muisca took place from 1537 to 1540. The Muisca were the inhabitants of the central Andean highlands of Colombia before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors. They were organised in a loose confederation of different rulers; the psihipqua of Muyquytá, with his headquarters in Funza, the hoa of Hunza, the iraca of the sacred City of the Sun Sugamuxi, the Tundama of Tundama, and several other independent caciques. The most important rulers at the time of the conquest were psihipqua Tisquesusa, hoa Eucaneme, iraca Sugamuxi and Tundama in the northernmost portion of their territories. The Muisca were organised in small communities of circular enclosures, with a central square where the bohío of the cacique was located. They were called "Salt People" because of their extraction of salt in various locations throughout their territories, mainly in Zipaquirá, Nemocón, and Tausa. For the main part self-sufficient in their well-organised economy, the Muisca traded with the European conquistadors valuable products as gold, tumbaga, and emeralds with their neighbouring indigenous groups. In the Tenza Valley, to the east of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense where the majority of the Muisca lived, they extracted emeralds in Chivor and Somondoco. The economy of the Muisca was rooted in their agriculture with main products maize, yuca, potatoes, and various other cultivations elaborated on elevated fields. Agriculture had started around 3000 BCE on the Altiplano, following the preceramic Herrera Period and a long epoch of hunter-gatherers since the late Pleistocene. The earliest archaeological evidence of inhabitation in Colombia, and one of the oldest in South America, has been found in El Abra, dating to around 12,500 years BP.
Hernán Pérez de Quesada, sometimes spelled as Quezada, was a Spanish conquistador. Second in command of the army of his elder brother, Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, Hernán was part of the first European expedition towards the inner highlands of the Colombian Andes. The harsh journey, taking almost a year and many deaths, led through the modern departments Magdalena, Cesar, Santander, Boyacá, Cundinamarca and Huila of present-day Colombia between 1536 and 1539 and, without him, Meta, Caquetá and Putumayo of Colombia and northern Peru and Ecuador between 1540 and 1542.
Luis Lanchero, also known as Luis Lancheros was a Spanish conquistador and the founder of the town of Trinidad de los Muzos, Boyacá, the most important emerald settlement in Colombia. Muzo was founded after twenty years of unsuccessful attempts to subjugate the Muzo to Spanish rule. Lanchero arrived in the New World in 1533 and died impoverished in Tunja in 1562.
Furatena Airport is an airport serving the emerald region of the western emerald belt and town of Quípama in the Boyacá Department of Colombia. The airport is four nautical miles west of Muzo Airport.
Colombia 
