Chiquinquirá is a town and

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

in the

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

n Department of Boyacá, part of the subregion of the Western Boyacá Province. Located some 115 km north of

Bogotá Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish Imperial period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city, capital and largest city ...

, Chiquinquirá is situated above sea level and has a yearly average temperature

Etymology

The name Chiquinquirá comes from

Chibcha The Muisca (also called the Chibcha) are indigenous peoples in Colombia and were a Pre-Columbian cultures of Colombia, Pre-Columbian culture of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense that formed the Muisca Confederation before the Spanish colonizati ...

and means "Place of swamps covered with fog".Etymology Chiquinquirá
- Excelsio.net

Geography and religion

Chiquinquirá is constituted by two zones: the urban zone or town which is formed by approximately 40 neighborhoods between the strata 1 and 4, and the rural zone which is divided in 17 sub zones located around the city. It is home to the Basílica de Chiquinquirá, which houses the image of the Virgen de Chiquinquirá, the patroness saint of Colombia. Chiquinquirá is a major point of religious pilgrimage.

History

The area of Chiquinquirá used to be inhabited by the

Muisca The Muisca (also called the Chibcha) are indigenous peoples in Colombia and were a Pre-Columbian culture of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense that formed the Muisca Confederation before the Spanish colonization of the Americas. The Muisca spe ...

before the

Spanish conquest The Spanish Empire, sometimes referred to as the Hispanic Monarchy or the Catholic Monarchy, was a colonial empire that existed between 1492 and 1976. In conjunction with the Portuguese Empire, it ushered in the European Age of Discovery. It ...

and Chiquinquirá was an important place in the Chiquinquirá Valley. It was ruled by an independent ''

cacique A cacique, sometimes spelled as cazique (; ; feminine form: ), was a tribal chieftain of the Taíno people, who were the Indigenous inhabitants of the Bahamas, the Greater Antilles, and the northern Lesser Antilles at the time of European cont ...

'' within the

Muisca Confederation The Muisca Confederation was a loose confederation of different Muisca rulers (''zaques'', ''zipas'', ''iraca'', and ''tundama'') in the central Andes, Andean highlands of what is today Colombia before the Spanish conquest of the Americas, Spanis ...

. It was never properly founded as a municipality.Official website Chiquinquirá
/ref> In November 1967, 81 people in Chiquinquirá, most of them children, were fatally poisoned and hundreds more became seriously ill after eating bread that had been made with flour that had been contaminated with a powdered

insecticide Insecticides are pesticides used to kill insects. They include ovicides and larvicides used against insect eggs and larvae, respectively. The major use of insecticides is in agriculture, but they are also used in home and garden settings, i ...

. Murder charges would later be filed against a

truck driver who had delivered the flour and the owner of the bakery that had baked and sold the bread to local residents."Colombia Files Murder Charges in Poison Deaths", ''Star Tribune'' (Minneapolis, MN), December 10, 1967, p26B

Climate

Geology

The Chiquinquirá Sandstone is named after the town.

Gallery

References

{{Authority control Municipalities of Boyacá Department Populated places of the Muisca Confederation