Tobosi is a

district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...

of the

El Guarco El Guarco was a Costa Rican indigenous king, at the time of the Spanish conquest. Its name is preserved in the eastern sector of the Central Valley of Costa Rica, where the city of Cartago is located, in the El Guarco canton in the Cartago Prov ...

canton, in the Cartago province of

Costa Rica Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...

. It is located about 3 miles southwest of the city of Cartago. It is also known as San Juan de Tobosi. St. John the Evangelist is the town's patron guardian.

History

Tobosi is one of the oldest town in the country. It was established as a reduction by the Spanish authorities and the

Franciscan friars The Franciscans are a group of related Mendicant orders, mendicant Christianity, Christian Catholic religious order, religious orders within the Catholic Church. Founded in 1209 by Italian Catholic friar Francis of Assisi, these orders include t ...

around 1575, with a population of one hundred people. Other interpretations suggest that the town started with a hundred families. Until 1826, the population consisted exclusively of indigenous peoples (ethnic Huet), but due to its proximity to the city of Cartago, its inhabitants were frequently used as forced labor for the benefit of the Spanish population and rapidly lost their

language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...

dress A dress (also known as a frock or a gown) is a garment traditionally worn by women or girls consisting of a skirt with an attached bodice (or a matching bodice giving the effect of a one-piece garment). It consists of a top piece that covers ...

and

customs Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting tariffs and for controlling the flow of goods, including animals, transports, personal effects, and hazardous items, into and out of a country. Traditionally, customs ...

. In 1568, responding to protests against the common abuses resulting from the direct enslavement of indigenous people by conquistadors, the Spanish King, Phillip II, created laws to protect the Indians and decreed such parceling out of indigenous peoples as slaves to be illegal. Instead of being owned directly by individual conquistadors, Indian villages or tribes were to pay a prescribed amount into a fund out of which an annual stipend was to be paid to each of the grantees. Nonetheless, the conquistadors protested to their Governor against this new arrangement and in January 1569 the Governor, Pero Afán de Ribera y Gómez, illegally apportioned the indigenous peoples as slaves, including those of the villages surrounding Cartago, among approximately forty Spaniards. During its period of Spanish domination, the town had its own town council or

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

, which was abolished in 1836 by the government of

Braulio Carrillo Colina Braulio Evaristo Carrillo Colina (March 20, 1800, Cartago, Costa Rica – May 15, 1845) was the Head of State of Costa Rica (the title as it was known before the reform of 1848) during two periods: the first between 1835 and 1837, and the de ...

. Like other indigenous communities in the Central Valley of

, the people also lost their communal lands, which were confiscated and sold at public auction.

Geography

Tobosi has an area of km² and an elevation of metres.

Locations

* ''Poblados'' (villages): Achiotillo, Barrancas, Bodocal, Garita, Purires, Tablón

Demographics

For the 2011 census, Tobosi had a population of inhabitants.

Transportation

Road transportation

The district is covered by the following road routes: * CR RNS 228

National Route 228

Economy

The main economic activities 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 ...

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 ...

and some

handicrafts A handicraft, sometimes more precisely expressed as artisanal handicraft or handmade, is any of a wide variety of types of work where useful and decorative objects are made completely by one’s hand or by using only simple, non-automated re ...

baskets A basket is a container that is traditionally constructed from stiff fibers and can be made from a range of materials, including wood splints, runners, and cane. While most baskets are made from plant materials, other materials such as horsehai ...

and

rope A rope is a group of yarns, plies, fibres, or strands that are twisted or braided together into a larger and stronger form. Ropes have tensile strength and so can be used for dragging and lifting. Rope is thicker and stronger than similarly ...

References

{{CostaRica-geo-stub Districts of Cartago Province Populated places in Cartago Province