Teyuna, the lost city of the Tayrona
The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, in Colombia, is an immense mountain massif with an area of 17,000 square kilometers. The highest peaks in the Sierra are Pico Colón and Pico Bolívar, which, at 5775 meters high, are the highest in Colombia. They are also the highest peaks in the world near the sea, from which they are no more than 42 kilometers away.
In the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta all the climates of the Earth are present, except the desert.
The area was inhabited since ancient times, but starting in the era of Christ, the Tayrona people, of Meso-American origin, who expressed themselves in Chibcha, settled there.
The Tayrona did not know writing, nor the use of the wheel or the use of animals. However, they had practiced large-scale agriculture, which allowed them to obtain excess production.
They lived in several settlements: the one known today as Pueblito, in Tayrona Park, was one of the largest, with approximately 1,000 cabins. Adobe huts were commonly built on circular bases delimited by stone retaining walls.
Other settlements, now lost, were Bonda, Pocigueica, Tayronaca and Betoma, all located in places not far from the coast. Inside the Sierra Nevada, at a height of approximately 1,200 meters above sea level, Teyuna, a spiritual and commercial center of primary importance, was located.
To get to Teyuna it is necessary to walk through the narrow paths of the Sierra Nevada.
The first stop of the trip is made in Mamey, a small settler town that is reached by an unpaved road. From Mamey you continue walking, climbing up and down the paths of the Sierra. From the first day of the tour you can see the lush vegetation, the tropical forest and have contact with the Kogui people, descendants of the Tayrona.
On the second day the road continues and enters the valley of the Buritaca River. You visit Mutanji, the country of the Kogui and you can have contact with these indigenous people, who still speak Chibcha today and follow the ancestral traditions of the Tayrona.
On the third day the tour continues and after having crossed the Buritaca River a dozen times, with water up to the waist, you reach a point where you can see a steep staircase, built by the Tayrona. There are approximately 1,200 steps before reaching Teyuna and being able to glimpse the first terraces delimited by stone retaining walls that served as support for the cabins.
Teyuna in the Chibcha language means origin of the people of the Earth, but the popular name of this important archaeological site is lost city. Teyuna remained, in fact, abandoned and forgotten for about 375 years, until the date of its discovery in 1973. It is sometimes also called Buritaca 200, in reference to the number of archaeological sites discovered in the area of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta.
After the incursions of the Spanish in the coastal area of Santa Marta, starting in 1525, the Tayrona moved deeper and deeper into the Sierra Nevada and probably took refuge in Teyuna around 1540.
In the valley of the Buritaca River, in a In an area between 500 and 2000 meters of altitude, 32 urban centers were found. Some have only 50 terraces, delimited by retaining walls, others, like Teyuna, have about 140 embankments. These settlements are: Tigres, Alto de Mira, Frontera and Tankua.
Teyuna, whose stone structures are located at an altitude between 900 and 1,200 meters above sea level, was the main center of the entire valley and fulfilled a spiritual and commercial role.
Probably 2 cabins were built on each terrace. It can be estimated, therefore, that the total population of Teyuna comprised 1,500 people, for a total of 280 cabins.
The Tayronas decided, over time, to modify the steep and rugged terrain to obtain flat surfaces suitable for the construction of their residential units.
Some Tayrona walls have a height of up to 9 meters and in addition to containing the terraces, they serve to mark paths, channel water flows and prevent the erosion of the mountains. The shape of the terraces varies depending on the location and probably according to the use for which they were intended. Those located higher up are oval, while the others are mostly semicircular or circular. Its extension varies from 50 to 880 square meters.
In the Sierra Nevada the rainfall regime is abundant: from 2000 to 4000 mm annually. The Tayrona architects were forced to perfect techniques to control the flow of water. Underground canals were built that still function today. In addition, the surface of the terraces has an average slope of 10% towards the outside.
The economy of the Tayrona, based on agriculture, allowed them to sustain the dense population in the Sierra Nevada for approximately 700 years, in a period from the 9th century to the end of the 16th century of the era of Christ. After the analysis and study of the traditions of the Kogi, descendants of the Tayrona, it is deduced that Teyuna was abandoned around 1600 and that it remained forgotten, exactly, for more than three centuries. Epidemics probably spread that forced the Tayrona to abandon their city and disperse into small settlements along the valley, difficult to access to the Spanish.
Over time, the natives of the Sierra Nevada stopped visiting Teyuna, although in Kogi traditions the exact location of the city was carefully guarded.
Around 1970, some farmers who colonized the lower part of the Sierra Nevada, up to approximately 700 meters above sea level, learned of the possibilities of finding great treasures. In a short time, some of them organized themselves and without any archaeological preparation, they dedicated themselves to the looting of the Tayrona tombs, an illegal activity called guaquería.
The guaqueros went deeper and deeper into the Sierra until, in 1973, one of them, Julio César Sepúlveda, arrived at the lost city and began to loot it. Almost simultaneously, another guaquero, Jorge Restrepo, along with his men arrived in Teyuna and dedicated himself to looting. The two sides clashed and the two leaders died in the bloody combat. History repeated itself again. After almost 500 years since the first Europeans landed in America, the mania for getting rich with the gold buried in indigenous tombs continued to kill victims.
The looting persisted. In Santa Marta, in 1975, there were unscrupulous merchants who organized the guaqueros' expeditions to the Sierra Nevada. They provided them with economic means: mules, weapons, shovels, food, and in exchange they obtained the guaqueros' obligation to sell archaeological finds only to them, often of inestimable intrinsic and artistic value.
The finds were then resold on the international market and lost forever.
Fortunately, this infamous trade was interrupted in 1976, when a scientific expedition organized by the Colombian Institute of Anthropology reached Teyuna and began a process of valorization, restoration and conservation of the finds and the terraces of the city.
Five people arrived in Teyuna in 1976: the archaeologists Gilberto Cadavid and Luisa Fernanda Herrera de Turbay, the architect and writer Bernardo Valderrama Andrade and the local guides Francisco Rey and 'El Negro' Rodríguez.
After their excavation work on the terraces of Teyuna, they obtained important finds such as gold jewelry and finely carved ceramic vessels. Some Spanish swords and halberds were also found, but it is not clear if some groups of Spaniards arrived at Teyuna or if these weapons were buried in the tombs as war trophies.
Today Teyuna is open and available to everyone. The Colombian government protects this wonderful place from further looting.
YURI LEVERATTO
