History of Bogotá, D.C., Colombia

History of Bogotá, D.C., Colombia

The first settlers of Bogotá were the Muiscas, belonging to the Chibcha linguistic family. At the arrival of the conquerors, it is estimated that there were half a million indigenous people of this group. They occupied the highlands and temperate slopes between the Sumapaz massif in the southwest and the Nevado del Cocuy in the northeast, in an area of ​​about 25,000 km2 that encompasses the high plateau of Bogotá, part of the current department of Boyacá and a small region of Santander.

In this area, the population was organized into two federations, each under the command of a chief: the southwestern area was dominated by Zipa, whose center was in Bacatá, present-day Bogotá. The northeastern zone constituted the domain of Zaque, whose center was the Hunza region, present-day Tunja. However, the Muisca population, unlike the Tairona, did not develop large cities.

The Muiscas, eminently farmers, formed a dispersed population that occupied numerous small villages and hamlets. In addition, there were some free isolated tribes: the Iraca or Sugamuxi, the Tundama and the Guanentá. The main occupation of its inhabitants was agriculture complemented by hunting and fishing. Its main crops were corn, potatoes, beans, squash, tomatoes, cubes, cassava, tobacco, arracacha, sweet potatoes, as well as various fruits and vegetables. In the field of mining, the exploitation of salt and emeralds was fundamental for their own use and for trading with other tribes that supplied them with gold and cotton.

Colony

Foundation of Bogotá

 

With the slogan of the conquerors to found and populate, Quesada resolved to create an urban settlement where they could live in an orderly manner under a stable government. Towards the east, at the foot of the hills, they found an Indian village called Teusaquillo near the Zipa recreational residence, provided with water, firewood, land for planting and sheltered from the winds by the hills of Monserrate and Guadalupe.

Although there is no founding document of the city, it has been accepted as the foundation date on August 6, 1538. According to tradition, that day the priest Fray Domingo de las Casas officiated the first mass in a straw church, built near the current cathedral or the current Santander Park. It is said that that day the region received the name of the New Kingdom of Granada and the town was called Santa Fe.

The Botanical Expedition

 

The most important contribution of this time to the scientific knowledge of American nature is constituted by the Botanical Expedition, whose objective was the study of native flora. It began by order of the archbishop-viceroy Caballero y Góngora under the direction of José Celestino Mutis and with the contribution of scientists such as Francisco José de Caldas, Jorge Tadeo Lozano and Francisco Antonio Zea. It had its headquarters in Mariquita and in 1791 it moved to Santa Fe, where it lasted until 1816.

 

Religion

 

After having dominated the indigenous people through war, the conquest of consciences by religion began with the help of the religious orders that were established since the 16th century throughout the territory of present-day Colombia. Churches and convents were built by the Franciscan, Dominican, and Augustinian communities, and later, in 1604, by the Jesuits, the Capuchins, and the Poor Clare, Dominican, and Discalced Carmelite nuns.

These communities marked the spirit and customs of the people of Santa Fe, as they exercised an ideological, political and cultural dominance that was barely diminished when, in 1767, Carlos III ordered the expulsion of the Jesuits from the colonies of Spain in America.

La Patria Boba

The political upheaval that existed in the colonies of Spain in Latin America, had in New Granada various manifestations that accelerated the independence process. One of the most important was the Revolution of the Comuneros, a popular uprising that began in the Villa del Socorro - now Santander department - in March 1781. The movement was repressed by the Spanish authorities and José Antonio Galán, its leader, was executed. However, he left a mark that was followed in 1794 by Antonio Nariño, a precursor of independence with the translation and publication in Santafé, of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, and the leaders of the movement of July 20, 1810. This cry of independence originated in an apparently inconsequential dispute between Creoles and Spaniards, over the loan of a vase.

The name Patria Boba has been given to the period between 1810 and 1815, because during these years the Creoles faced each other in search of ideal forms of government, the first ideological struggles appeared and the first two republican parties - federalists and centralists.

The Age of Terror and Independence

In 1815, the Pacifying Expedition under Pablo Morillo, who tried to reconquer the rebel colony, arrived on the shores of New Granada. A time of repression began then that lasted until 1819. New Granada lived through the period of the War of Independence, which cost the lives of distinguished personalities and culminated in the triumph of the liberation campaign led by Simón Bolívar and Francisco de Paula Santander in the battles of Pantano de Vargas and Boyacá (1819), which sealed independence.

Urban Design

The urban layout was designed in the form of a grid and since then the measure of one hundred meters for each canvas of the block has been implemented. The crossing streets - east-west - were 7 meters wide and the current races, 10 meters. In 1553 the Plaza Mayor - today Plaza de Bolívar - was moved to the site it currently occupies and the construction of the first cathedral on the eastern side began. On the other sides the headquarters of the Cabildo and the Royal Court were located. The street that communicated the Plaza Mayor with the Plaza de las Hierbas, - now Parque Santander - was called "Calle Real", today Carrera Séptima.

Schools

As in the rest of Hispanic America, the religious orders were fundamental in the field of education. The first two university chairs are due to the Dominican friars (1563 and 1573). In 1592 the Colegio Seminario de San Bartolomé was founded to impart higher education to the children of the Spanish; the Jesuits directed this college in 1605 and founded the Colegio Máximo, located in one of the corners of the Plaza Mayor.

In 1580 the Dominicans founded the Pontifical University of Santo Tomás de Aquino for Arts and Philosophy, and in 1621 the Jesuits began courses at the University of San Francisco Javier or Javeriana. In 1653, Fray Cristóbal de Torres founded the Colegio Mayor de Nuestra Señora del Rosario. In 1783 the first educational community and the first school for the education of women began in New Granada: the Colegio de La Enseñanza, in the community of María. From that moment, school lessons for women began, a right that until then was reserved for boys.

The Population

Although Bogotá lacked a significant flow of foreign immigrants, according to the censuses carried out during the 19th century, the population had a fairly regular growth: in 1832 it had 36,465 inhabitants; in 1881, 84,723 inhabitants and towards the end of the century almost 100,000.

The growth of the population from 1850 on was due in part to the reforms of the Middle Century that expanded the sources of work. Bogotá offered the possibility of working in commerce or performing various functions. This increase produced a physical expansion of the city, which expanded northward and created new neighborhoods as far as the Chapinero hamlet, five kilometers from the city center.

Cultural Life in the City

Bogotá was an isolated city because of the communication routes that were very precarious. Only at the end of the century did this isolation give way thanks to the railroad and some highways that put it in contact with the Magdalena River and through it with the Caribbean coast.

In the sixties, writers of diverse tendencies gathered around the Mosaico magazine, founded and directed by José María Vergara y Vergara, and formed one of the first attempts to record Colombian literature and to consolidate the country's cultural identity.

The cultural life of the city was concentrated in the literary gatherings that during the nineteenth century allowed the people of Bogota to attend musical presentations and dramatic works. Theater and opera performances were held at the Maldonado Theater and, at the end of the 19th century, Bogotá had two important theaters: the Cristóbal Colón Theater, inaugurated in 1892, and the Municipal Theater, inaugurated in 1895, which offered zarzuelas. and music magazines.

During the 19th century, the traditions and customs of the colonial era were preserved, combined with some European influences. During meetings, chocolate with snacks and sweets made in the houses were served, and the ajiaco became the typical dish. In the evenings, musical pieces by local composers were played on the piano, and in the larger gatherings tel pasillo was danced, a form of fast waltz named after the short steps that were taken when executing the dance.

The Railway

 

The Northern railway project that would link Bogotá with the Carare river, a tributary of the Magdalena, dates back to the time of radicalism, but only began to take shape with the first of the sections, which was the Girardot railway, contracted by the government. with Francisco Javier Cisneros in 1881, and whose first route linked the port on the Magdalena with Tocaima. In 1898 the road reached Anapoima and in 1908 it joined with Facatativá. From that moment on, the people of Bogotá were able to travel by rail to the Magdalena River. The Bogotá-Chapinero-Puente del Común route was inaugurated in 1894. The Bogotá savannah had one hundred kilometers of railways.

The Phone

As of September 21, 1881, the first telephone line in Bogotá linked the National Palace with the post and telegraph offices of the city, and on August 14, 1884, the municipality of Bogotá granted the Cuban citizen José Raimundo Martínez the privilege of establishing the public telephone service in the city. In December of the same year, the first device was installed in the office of Messrs. González Benito Hermanos, connected to another in Chapinero.

 

Twentieth Century

The Liberal Republic

 

In 1938 the fourth centenary of the founding of Bogotá was celebrated, whose population was already 333,312 inhabitants. This celebration produced a good number of infrastructure works, new constructions and sources of work. The liberal party divided, in 1946 the conservative candidate rose to power again and in 1948, following the death of the liberal leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, the center of Bogotá was practically destroyed and violence escalated. As of that date, the city underwent a series of fundamental changes in its urban, architectural and population aspects.

Citizen Life in the 20th Century

During these years the transformation of Bogota's cultural life accelerated, in part thanks to the new means of communication. Newspapers, national and foreign magazines, cinema, radio, telegraphic and telephone communications multiplied, and air transport communicated Bogotá with the rest of the world. The waves of peasants and farm owners fleeing the violence, and those who came to Bogotá in search of work and better opportunities, tripled the population from 700,000 in 1951, to 1,600,000 in 1964 and 2,500,000 inhabitants. in 1973. During the years of the dictatorship of General Rojas Pinilla (1953 to 1957), television began in Colombia and works were carried out such as the El Dorado airport that replaced the old Techo airport.

Bogotá, Special District and Capital District

In 1954 the municipalities of Usme, Bosa, Fontibón, Engativá, Suba and Usaquén were annexed to Bogotá, thus creating the Special District of Bogotá, which was projected towards future growth and organized the new administrative structure of the city. In 1991, due to the new Constitution, Bogotá became the Capital District. According to the 1985 census the population of the capital had increased to 4,100,000 and in 1993 it reached almost 6,000,000. At present (2016), the inhabitants of the city are more than 8,000,000.

Economic Transformation

The economy of the city has had great development and diversification. Industrial production is immense, which has necessitated the creation of important specialized industrial zones. Handicraft production has become one of the most appreciated ornamental and utilitarian expressions and a source of income for family businesses.

The Sabana de Bogotá has become a center for the production of flowers that are exported to many countries, generate foreign exchange and are a source of work that absorbs an immense amount of labor. The informal economy and microenterprises employ a large sector of the population in various activities.

Cultural Life

Beginning in 1950, Bogotá began a profound development in architecture, sculpture, painting, music, literature and education. Currently, universities offer studies and specializations in various artistic careers. The faculties of Philosophy, Literature, History, Humanities and Social Sciences, at the undergraduate, master's and doctoral levels, are training internationally recognized professors, researchers, scientists, writers, musicians and filmmakers.

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