The terms Muisca religion and mythology refer to the

pre-Columbian In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era spans from the original settlement of North and South America in the Upper Paleolithic period through European colonization, which began with Christopher Columbus's voyage of 1492. Usually, ...

beliefs 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 ...

indigenous people of the Cordillera Oriental highlands of the

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 ...

in the vicinity of

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

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 ...

. The tradition includes a selection of received myths concerning the origin and organization of the

universe The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies, and all other forms of matter and energy. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the univers ...

. Their belief system may be described as a

polytheistic Polytheism is the belief in multiple deities, which are usually assembled into a pantheon of gods and goddesses, along with their own religious sects and rituals. Polytheism is a type of theism. Within theism, it contrasts with monotheism, the ...

religion containing a very strong element of spirituality based on an

epistemology Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Epi ...

mysticism Mysticism is popularly known as becoming one with God or the Absolute, but may refer to any kind of ecstasy or altered state of consciousness which is given a religious or spiritual meaning. It may also refer to the attainment of insight in ...

Muisca religion

Creation of the universe

Bachué The goddess Bachué (in Chibcha language: "the one with the naked breast"), is a mother goddess that according to the Muisca religion is the mother of humanity. She emerged of the waters in the Iguaque Lake with a baby in her arms, who grew to ...

("the Grandmother") is a non-material principle of creation, the will, the thought and the imagination of all the things to come. She is a similar concept to the principle of '' tao'' in the

Chinese mythology Chinese mythology () is mythology that has been passed down in oral form or recorded in literature in the geographic area now known as Greater China. Chinese mythology includes many varied myths from regional and cultural traditions. Much of ...

. The time of ''unquyquie nxie'' ("the first thought") is the time of the cosmic origin, when the thoughts of Bague became actions. This is the time when Bague created the builders of the universe and ordered them to create.

Beginning of the world

The world started with ''Chimi'' ("the pulp"), the first material object in the world. Then, in the inners of ''tomsa'', were incubated the embryos of

star A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma (physics), plasma held together by its gravity. The List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs, nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked ...

s, embryos of

land Land, also known as dry land, ground, or earth, is the solid terrestrial surface of the planet Earth that is not submerged by the ocean or other bodies of water. It makes up 29% of Earth's surface and includes the continents and various isla ...

and embryos of

stone In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its Chemical compound, chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks ...

. When ''tomsa'' was full, the seeds of the earth emerged and the remains were thrown away, forming the

Milky Way The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. ...

. The elements were distributed to the deities: the heat to Sué – the

sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

, the cold to Chía – the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

, and the clouds and smoke to the

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's sur ...

, but all the things were still seeds and nothing was germinated. Then, ''Mnya'',

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...

, energy, was united with ''Chimi'', the pulp, and became ''Chímini'', the creative force, which caused the germination of the seeds of all things.

Origin of mankind

According to Muisca legends, mankind was originated in

Lake Iguaque Lake Iguaque is a lake located in the Boyacá Department of Colombia. The lake and the surrounding area was declared a Flora and Fauna Sanctuary in 1977. Geography and climate Lake Iguaque is located northeast of Villa de Leyva and is part of ...

, when grandmother goddess Bachué came out from the lake with a boy in her arms. When the boy grew, they populated the earth. They are considered the ancestors of the human race. finally, they disappeared unto the lake in the shape of snakes.

Great flood

Due to transgressions against the divine laws,

Chibchacum Chibchacum is the rain and thunder god in the religion of the Muisca who inhabited the Altiplano Cundiboyacense in pre-Columbian times. Description In myth, when Chibchacum was angry, he sent heavy rains to the flatlands, causing the rivers ...

brought forth a

flood A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrol ...

that covered the world and nearly destroyed the human race. Then, the protective god

Bochica Bochica (also alluded to as Nemquetaha, Nemqueteba and Sadigua) is a figure in the religion of the Muisca, who inhabited the Altiplano Cundiboyacense during the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors in the central Andean highlands of present-day Co ...

drove away the waters through the

Tequendama Falls The Tequendama Falls () is a high waterfall of the Bogotá River, located southwest of Bogotá in the municipality of Soacha. Established in approximately 10,000 BCE, El Abra and Tequendama were the first permanent settlements in Colombia. ...

, and taught humans the basis of civilization,

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 ...

, religion, the arts, and crafts. When he was about to leave to his heavenly kingdom, Cuchavira (the

rainbow A rainbow is a meteorological phenomenon that is caused by reflection, refraction and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a spectrum of light appearing in the sky. It takes the form of a multicoloured circular arc. Rainbows c ...

) appeared and

announced his second coming, far away in the future, in an event marked by death and disease. These events are similar to the biblical histories of

Genesis Genesis may refer to: Bible * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of mankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Book of ...

and

Apocalypse Apocalypse () is a literary genre in which a supernatural being reveals cosmic mysteries or the future to a human intermediary. The means of mediation include dreams, visions and heavenly journeys, and they typically feature symbolic imager ...

Deities

The first gods, constructors of the universe, built the first ''cuca'' or ceremonial temple. They were: *

("The one with the naked breasts"): the

mother goddess A mother goddess is a goddess who represents a personified deification of motherhood, fertility goddess, fertility, creation, destruction, or the earth goddess who embodies the bounty of the earth or nature. When equated with the earth or t ...

who raised from the underworld to give birth to the human race *

("The father of civilization") also called Nemqueteba, Nemquereteba, Sadigua, Chimizapagua * Chía: the Moon goddess of the Muisca *

("The one who holds the earth"): the universal legislator *

Chiminigagua Chiminigagua, Chiminichagua or Chimichagua was the supreme being, omnipotent god and creator of the world in the religion of the Muisca.Ocampo López, 2013, Ch.1, p.15 The Muisca and their confederation were one of the four advanced civilizat ...

: trinity deity, constituted by ''Chí'', ''Chímini'' and ''Chiminigagua'' * Cuchavira: god of the rainbow * Cuza ("The one who is like the night"): the male principle of creation * Huitaca: rebelling goddess of sexual liberation * Nencatacoa ("The protector of festivities, beer, and the arts") The gods danced a very long dance (''sas quyhynuca''), with the music of the ''fo'' drum, in the first ceremony. This ceremony gave origin to

space Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consi ...

and

time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

. Then, the gods created the first materials of the universe: ''fiva'' (the air), ''faova'' (the cosmic cloud) and ''ie'' (the smoke). Then, they created the six directions of the material

dimension In physics and mathematics, the dimension of a mathematical space (or object) is informally defined as the minimum number of coordinates needed to specify any point within it. Thus, a line has a dimension of one (1D) because only one coord ...

, and in the middle of ''itugue'', the emptiness, they created the centre of power ''tomsa'' ( bellybutton of the universe). But, still the universe had no consistence, and they waited many ''bxogonoas''

aeon The word aeon , also spelled eon (in American and Australian English), originally meant "life", "vital force" or "being", "generation" or "a period of time", though it tended to be translated as "age" in the sense of "ages", "forever", "timele ...

s until the ''sas bequia'', the beginning of the world.

References

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