Muisca

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The Muisca was a South American nation that lived mainly in modern-day Cundinamarca and Boyacá highlands of Colombia. At the arrival of the Spanish conquistadores they were organised in two regions, governed by the Zipa in Bogotá and the Zaque in Hunza (now Tunja) respectively. It was believed that the Zipas descended from the Moon (Chía) and the Zaques from the Sun (Sué). As with many autonyms, the word Muisca is a Chibchan word for "People".

They farmed maize, potato, quinoa and cotton, among others. They were very skilled goldsmiths, bartered emeralds, blankets, ceramic handicrafts, coca and salt, amongst them and neighbour nations in the bank of the Magdalena River.

Living in central Colombia, they were located exactly in the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, which extends from the North of Boyacá to the Sumapaz páramo, and from the summit to the foot of the Cordillera Oriental, next to the Panches and Pijaos.

In modern-day Colombia, it was the most complex culture in terms of administration and state political and administrative structure - divided into confederations ruled by caciques, with a uniform system of roads, language, taxes, religion, and law.

Guatavita is the essential location of the first account of El Dorado, where local legends say a young girl broke a pot; water flowing from it made the lake. The modern legends relate that, later, during the Spanish conquest, the locals threw their wealth into the lake to prevent it from being discovered by the conquerors: the ritual of giving gold to the lake, described by the 16th-century chronicler Juan Rodriguez Freyle, is quoted at El Dorado (legend). Today sacred places like the lakes of Guatavita, Fuquene, Tota and Iguaque still remain.

[edit] Current Muisca population

There is a small number of surviving Muisca communities all of them located at the outskirts of Bogotá. By the end of 2006, there were three Muisca reservations in the towns of Cota, Chía, Sesquilé with a total population of 2,318 people. There are also two Muisca reservations within Bogotá, one in the locality of Suba with 5,186 members and the other in the locality of Bosa with a population of 1,573 people. The latter ones were outlawed for more than century until the constitution of 1991 restored their legal right to exist as indigenous communities.