Macanal is a town and municipality in the

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

Department Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...

of Boyacá, part of the subregion of the

Neira Province The Neira Province is a subregion of the Colombian Department of Boyacá. The subregion is formed by 6 municipalities. The province is named after Juan Nepomuceno Neira. Municipalities Chinavita • Garagoa • Macanal Macanal is a town an ...

. The urban centre is located in the

Tenza Valley The Tenza Valley (Spanish: ''Valle de Tenza'') is an intermontane valley in the Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes. The valley stretches over the southeastern part of the department of Boyacá and the northeastern part of Cundinamarca. It ...

in the

Eastern Ranges The Eastern Ranges is an Australian rules football team in the NAB League, the Victorian statewide under-18s competition. The club is a founding member of the competition (1992) and has produced several players for the Australian Football Leagu ...

of the Colombian

Andes The Andes, Andes Mountains or Andean Mountains (; ) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is long, wide (widest between 18°S – 20°S ...

at an elevation of but parts of the municipality reach elevations of . It borders

Campohermoso Campohermoso () is a town and municipality in the Colombian Department of Boyacá, part of the subregion of the Lengupá Province. Climate Campohermoso has a tropical monsoon climate (Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with th ...

in the east, Almeida in the west,

Garagoa Garagoa () is a town and municipality in Colombia, located in the Boyacá Department. It covers an area of 191.75 km2 and the urban centre is located at an altitude of above sea level. Parts of the municipality reach altitudes of . It is the ...

in the north and in the south Santa María and

Chivor 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 and Chivor is located at from the department capital Tunja. Economic ac ...

.Official website Macanal
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Etymology

The name Macanal is either derived from the

Chibcha The Muisca (also called Chibcha) are an indigenous people and culture of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, Colombia, that formed the Muisca Confederation before the Spanish conquest. The people spoke Muysccubun, a language of the Chibchan lan ...

word ''Macana'', meaning

garrote A garrote or garrote vil (a Spanish word; alternative spellings include garotte and similar variants''Oxford English Dictionary'', 11th Ed: garrotte is normal British English spelling, with single r alternate. Article title is US English spellin ...

, or from the Macana palm tree ('' Wettinia kalbreyeri'').Etymology Municipalities Boyacá
- Excelsio.net

History

The area of Macanal was part of the

Muisca Confederation The Muisca Confederation was a loose confederation of different Muisca rulers (''zaques'', ''zipas'', '' iraca'', and ''tundama'') in the central Andean highlands of present-day Colombia before the Spanish conquest of northern South America. The ...

, a loose confederation of different

rulers A ruler, sometimes called a rule, line gauge, or scale, is a device used in geometry and technical drawing, as well as the engineering and construction industries, to measure distances or draw straight lines. Variants Rulers have long ...

of the

Muisca The Muisca (also called Chibcha) are an indigenous people and culture of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, Colombia, that formed the Muisca Confederation before the Spanish conquest. The people spoke Muysccubun, a language of the Chibchan langu ...

. The ''

zaque When the Spanish arrived in the central Colombian highlands, the region was organized into the Muisca Confederation, which had two rulers; the ''zipa'' was the ruler of the southern part and based in Muyquytá. The ''hoa'' was the ruler of the n ...

'' of

Hunza Hunza may refer to: * Hunza, Iran * Hunza Valley, an area in the Gilgit-Baltistan region of Pakistan ** Hunza (princely state), a former principality ** Hunza District, a recently established district ** Hunza River, a waterway ** Hunza Peak, a mou ...

ruled over Macanal. Modern Macanal was founded on May 4, 1807.

Geology

The

Macanal Formation The Macanal Formation or Macanal Shale ( es, (Formación) Lutitas de Macanal, Kilm, K1m) is a fossiliferous geological formation of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense and Tenza Valley in the Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes. The predominantly orga ...

, an organic shale,

outcrop An outcrop or rocky outcrop is a visible exposure of bedrock or ancient superficial deposits on the surface of the Earth. Features Outcrops do not cover the majority of the Earth's land surface because in most places the bedrock or superficial ...

s near and has been named after Macanal.

Economy

Main economical activities of Macanal are

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...

;

coffee Coffee is a drink prepared from roasted coffee beans. Darkly colored, bitter, and slightly acidic, coffee has a stimulant, stimulating effect on humans, primarily due to its caffeine content. It is the most popular hot drink in the world. S ...

(''

Coffea arabica ''Coffea arabica'' (), also known as the Arabic coffee, is a species of flowering plant in the coffee and madder family Rubiaceae. It is believed to be the first species of coffee to have been cultivated and is currently the dominant cultivar, r ...

''),

banana A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large herbaceous flowering plants in the genus ''Musa''. In some countries, bananas used for cooking may be called "plantains", distinguis ...

maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...

, beans (''

Phaseolus vulgaris ''Phaseolus vulgaris'', the common bean, is a herbaceous annual plant grown worldwide for its edible dry seeds or green, unripe pods. Its leaf is also occasionally used as a vegetable and the straw as fodder. Its botanical classification, alo ...

''),

yuca ''Manihot esculenta'', commonly called cassava (), manioc, or yuca (among numerous regional names), is a woody shrub of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae, native to South America. Although a perennial plant, cassava is extensively cultivated a ...

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with ...

(''

Saccharum officinarum ''Saccharum officinarum'' is a large, strong-growing species of grass in the genus ''Saccharum''. Its stout stalks are rich in sucrose, a simple sugar which accumulates in the stalk internodes. It originated in New Guinea, and is now cultivated ...

''), arracacha ('' Arracacia xanthorrhiza''),

avocado The avocado (''Persea americana'') is a medium-sized, evergreen tree in the laurel family (Lauraceae). It is native to the Americas and was first domesticated by Mesoamerican tribes more than 5,000 years ago. Then as now it was prized for i ...

es,

papaya The papaya (, ), papaw, () or pawpaw () is the plant species ''Carica papaya'', one of the 21 accepted species in the genus ''Carica'' of the family Caricaceae. It was first domesticated in Mesoamerica, within modern-day southern Mexico and ...

mango A mango is an edible stone fruit produced by the tropical tree ''Mangifera indica''. It is believed to have originated in the region between northwestern Myanmar, Bangladesh, and northeastern India. ''M. indica'' has been cultivated in South a ...

es,

guayaba Guava () is a common tropical fruit cultivated in many tropical and subtropical regions. The common guava ''Psidium guajava'' (lemon guava, apple guava) is a small tree in the myrtle family (Myrtaceae), native to Mexico, Central America, the C ...

and

cucumber Cucumber (''Cucumis sativus'') is a widely-cultivated Vine#Horticultural climbing plants, creeping vine plant in the Cucurbitaceae family that bears usually cylindrical Fruit, fruits, which are used as culinary vegetables.

s (''

Cucumis sativus Cucumber (''Cucumis sativus'') is a widely-cultivated creeping vine plant in the Cucurbitaceae family that bears usually cylindrical fruits, which are used as culinary vegetables.Cyclanthera pedata ''Cyclanthera pedata'', known as ''caigua'', is a herbaceous vine grown for its edible fruit, which is predominantly used as a vegetable. It is known from cultivation only, and its use goes back many centuries as evidenced by ancient phytomorph ...

''),

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...

farming and

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

(

gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, blackboard or sidewalk chalk, and drywall. ...

and

emerald Emerald is a gemstone and a variety of the mineral beryl (Be3Al2(SiO3)6) colored green by trace amounts of chromium or sometimes vanadium.Hurlbut, Cornelius S. Jr. and Kammerling, Robert C. (1991) ''Gemology'', John Wiley & Sons, New York, p ...

s).

Gallery

References

{{coord, 4, 58, 19, N, 73, 19, 10, W, display=title, region:CO_type:adm2nd_source:GNS-enwiki Municipalities of Boyacá Department 1807 establishments in the Spanish Empire Populated places established in 1807 Muisca Confederation