Muisca were the indigenous people who lived in the Cundiboyacense plateau of today’s Colombia, between the eastern and the western Andes covering an area of roughly 30,000 square kilometres. The Muisca tribe was a loose confederation of states that cannot be considered an empire as there was no central authority or emperor. For the autonomy the local chiefs enjoyed, they are considered one of the best-organised tribes in the Americas. 

The Caciques

The tribes were organised into groups headed by their own chief, each of whom was ruled by a Cacique. The Caciques were generally referred to as Zipa and Zaque depending on the territory that they ruled over. 

The territories of Zipa and Zaque are further subdivided into quiras that roughly fall under 8 major chiefs.

Zipa – Bacatá, Fusagasugá, Ubaté and Guatavita

Zaque – Hunza, Tundama, Sugamuxi, and certain autonomous chieftains

The territory around today’s Bogotá was ruled by a Zipa and was called Bacatá in those days. The language of the Muisca was called Chibcha and the influence of Muiscas can be felt over names of the towns and villages even today as most of these are Spanished versions of the existing Chibcha names such as Zipaquirá, Chía, Guachetá, Duitama, etc.

Muisca Society

The society was consuetudinary, in legal terms, this is defined as the existence of customary law or consuetudinary law where: A certain legal practice is observed and is considered a necessity. 

The caciques did not exercise absolute power or rigid or strict control over those to whom they owed their power so that they could be considered rulers in the most nominal form of our understanding of the Muisca society. The position of the ruler was inherited, but the line of succession was not patrilineal. Instead, the king was succeeded by his nephew, the oldest son of his oldest sister. 

They could be considered one of the first socialist premodern societies where woods, lakes, forests, and rivers could not be owned by someone other than the society. Women played an important role in Muisca society and are given as much importance as men. The women formed the central part of the family, community, arts, mythology, and in heritage. The laws prevented domestic violence, physical violence against women, and state support was provided for pregnant women, widows, etc. When the wife of a cacique died, the cacique was expected to abstain from sex from one to five years in memory of his wife.

Pantheon Of Muisca Religion

Muisca was a polytheistic society just like most civilizations around the world then. They believed in the legends of creation and the Goddess were considered equal in the Pantheon of the Muisca religion. 

The main creator God was Chimigagua and his female counterpart Bachué whom the Muiscas believed that they descended from. In fact, they believed themselves to be the children of Bachué. Though the list of Gods is long, we will only focus on the 7 main ones for now.  

Sacred Sites Of Muisca

The territory of the Muisca was filled with sacred sites, temples, and lakes that were considered important and holy for the Muisca, honouring their Gods and rulers.

One of the more popular ones here is the Guatavita Lake, famous for the legend of El Dorado (The Golden Man). This lake is located roughly over 3000 metres above sea level and is believed to be the place where the cacique of Bacatá covered himself with gold powder and jumped inside the lake to prove his worthiness to his people. The Spaniards were so involved in the story that they even attempted to drain this lake to find gold, which proved impossible. It was also believed that the Muiscas created this legend to divert the attention of the Spaniards and to let them live alone in peace.

Here is another view of the lake with the lovely frailejónes in the foreground. These are endemic to the Colombian Andes and are considered an important part of the Andean ecosystem as they capture the moisture in the air and send them to the soil thereby giving birth to the rivers of the Andes, including the biggest river in Colombia, the mighty Magdalena.

Another one of the popular sacred Muisca sites is Tota lake, which is considered to be the largest freshwater lake in Colombia and the second biggest in South America next only to Titicaca. Tota lake is about 3015 metres above sea level. 

Muisca Architecture

The Muisca were not huge stone builders and hence did not leave us with monumental ruins, unlike Mayas, Aztecs, or Incas. Almost all of the architecture was destroyed by the Spaniards during the time of the conquests. The houses of the Muisca, called bohíos, were circular structures made of poles of wood and walls of clay, with a conical roof. The house of the cacique was ceramic floored, while in normal houses, it was a straw mat. In a typical Muisca village, the biggest of these houses was always the temple while the cacique’s was generally the second biggest. 

The most important temple in modern memory of the Muisca is the Sun temple at Sogamoso, in the Boyacá department (state). This temple is believed to have housed Sué. People from all over the Muisca territory and beyond are believed to have visited this temple to perform pilgrimage and offer their produce from their farms. Though Spanish accounts claim that there were children sacrificed to the Gods, I was not able to find any direct evidence to suggest that this practice existed. 

This temple was considered to be of astronomical significance as well denoting the passage of the sun each month and the design was meant to be in such a way that on the days of the solstice in June and December, rays fell directly over the central pillar of the temple.

The temples were also believed to hold the mummies of the dead caciques and are on display in the museum nearby.

Having spent time understanding the civilization of the Muisca, we will have to look at how this civilization fell against the might of the Spanish. Instead of focusing on the conquest per se, our interest will be to look at how the religion of the Muisca was destroyed.

Conquistadores 

The conquistadores (conquerors) were originally approved to be a religious force or crusaders by the orders of Queen Isabella. Hence the motivation for all the conquest in the Americas though was primarily to conquer and steal the wealth of the region, it was all done in the guise of propagating the one true religion.

The first encounter of the Muisca with the Spaniards occurred in the 1530s and the conquest of the Muisca by the Spanish happened between the years 1537-40.

Tairona, along the mountains of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, was the first tribe to surrender to the Spaniards. The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta is a coastal mountain range that runs parallel to the Atlantic coast in Colombia. By 1536, the conquistadores led by Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada were led by 700 soldiers and 80 horses travelled along the Magdalena river towards the interior lands. Their motivation was the story of El Dorado, whose mythical capital was a city of gold high up in the inner highlands. 

Conquest Of The Muisca

Even though the Muisca formed alliances with one another, they did not stand a chance against three factors:

Smallpox – America was closed and the natives did not have immunity against Eurasian diseases. The Spaniards carried smallpox with them and this spread like the plague of late antiquity and the middle ages to which the natives did not have any immunity at all.

Horses – Cavalry was used effectively on the mountains against the Muisca who had not seen such animals in their life.

Superior weapons – The stone age weapons of wooden clubs, darts, stone spears, and slings did not stand a chance against the superior iron weapons and shields of the Spanish

Conversion Through Terror

Now after defeat, the caciques were offered a choice to accept the one true religion or God. This concept was new to the Muisca that were unable to apprehend how their Gods were called false Gods or worse, created to be used and exploited for the use of man. Some of the caciques were burnt at the stake which terrorised the local population. For them, the cacique was a ruler, a priest in short the representative of Chiminigagua, Bachué, Sué, and Chía. I can only imagine the confusion, the fear it caused the local population that witnessed the burning of the cacique.

Destruction Of Temples

Next, to prove their invincibility, the Spaniards went to destroy the sacred temples of Muisca, including the burning and destruction of the Sun and Moon temples. This left the local population nowhere to seek theological refuge. 

If you know the history of the Christianisation of the Roman Empire, you will know how the worship of the Sol Invictus or the Invincible Sun had grown popular in the 3rd century, propagated by Diocletian. The Sol Invictus effectively was transmogrified into Jesus, the Son of God by Constantine after he converted to Christianity.

Crescent Moon And Maria

Let us deviate a bit to understand the connection between the crescent moon and Maria. Moon as a deity or Goddess was common across most cultures across the world, from Marama in Polynesia to Kuu of Finnish, from Mawu in Dahomean to Chía in Muiscan culture. The emblem of ancient Byzantine was a crescent and star. Here is one of the earliest representations of the crescent moon in a coin from Byzantium, roughly from 150 BCE.

When Constantine rebuilt the city to make it the capital of the empire around 330 CE, the symbol was transferred to the Christian empire, which lasted for over 1100 years. When in 1453, Constantinople was conquered by the Ottomans, the crescent moon and star were adopted by them to be in their flag and eventually to Islam itself. 

Now when Constantine became Christian, he made efforts to adopt the existing Pantheon of Roman Gods into the Christian fold. This included Luna, the Roman Goddess of the moon, and hunting to be given a new identity in the Christian world. She was made to be a slave of Maria and became subservient to artistic representation.

In short, it may be said that the Catholic Jesus became the new age Sol Invictus (Invincible Sun) while Catholic Maria became the master of Luna, the Roman Moon Goddess.

Chía And Maria

Now back to the Muisca territory, the Spaniards effectively demonstrated to the local population that they could not only destroy their priest and king but also enslave their Gods. The image of Maria with the moon underneath her was repeatedly propagated to coerce the natives who had nowhere to go and seek clarity. When they saw that their Gods could be enslaved, they knew the time had come. Add to this the mysterious appearances of Maria to native women, only to natives and never the Spaniards, and the destruction of the Muisca religion was complete. Saints were invented to civilise the native population. Today, all churches that stand in the town centres of erstwhile Muisca territories, were built over destroyed temples of the Muisca.

The population was absorbed and either made slaves of the Spanish, and women were raped and or forcefully married to the Spaniards, thereby creating Mestisos, the mixed race. Today along with white Europeans they are about 87% of the total population as per the census 2018.

Transmogrification Of Muisca Religion

Bochicha, the messenger God was made to look like Jesus himself.

Sué became subservient to the Abrahamic God while Chía was made to look like a slave of Maria. 

Today Chía is a small town about 30 minutes away from Bogotá. Just as in any Spanish town, the centre is dominated by the church and the plaza. There is a monument to the Goddess Chía in the plaza. While I was collecting materials for this article, I had the opportunity to visit this town. I was struck by the symbolism of Chía the moon Goddess all over the historical centre. 

As a student of history and theology, I am supposed to report and write without emotions. Yet I became emotional after seeing this image. Notice how Chía is made to bow before the might of the Catholic church.

Today the Muisca religion exists in all but memory, murals, statues, and in museums. The Musica temples either no longer exist, are churches, or are mere reconstructed models. 

Here is a monument to the Sun in Sogamoso. Again, the Sun is subservient and the native is shown to bow and kneel before the Sun which is smaller than the Church behind.

Yet, the spirit of Muisca spirit lives on. In almost all the small towns and villages I have visited in this region, there is some reference to the Muisca, the ancestors that were the children of Bachué. The children who existed before Catholic Jesus was born.

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