Soatá 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' ...

Boyacá Department Boyacá () is one of the thirty-two departments of Colombia, and the remnant of Boyacá State, one of the original nine states of the "United States of Colombia". Boyacá is centrally located within Colombia, almost entirely within the mount ...

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 ...

. Soatá is located on the western slopes of the Cordillera Oriental mountain range, at the northeast end of the Department of Boyacá. It is the capital of the Northern Boyacá Province. Soatá borders Boavita in the east, Tipacoque in the north, Susacón in the south and in the west it borders the municipality Onzaga of the department of Santander.Official website Soatá
- accessed 06-05-2016

Climate

Etymology

Soatá in the

Chibcha language Chibcha, Mosca, Muisca, Muysca (*/ˈmɨska/ * �mʷɨska, or Muysca de Bogotá is a language spoken by the Muisca people, one of the many indigenous cultures of the Americas. The Muisca inhabit the Altiplano Cundiboyacense of what today is th ...

of the Muisca means ''tillage of the Sun''.

History

Soatá was already populated during the

Herrera Period The Herrera Period is a phase in the history of Colombia. It is part of the Andean preceramic and ceramic, time equivalent of the North American pre-Columbian era, pre-Columbian Formative stage, formative and classic stages and age dated by var ...

and at the time of 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 ...

, Soatá was 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 ...

. The village was part of the rule of the ''

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 ...

Tundama Tundama or Saymoso (15th century – late December 1539 in Duitama) was a ''cacique'' of the Muisca Confederation, a loose confederation of different rulers of the Muisca who inhabited the central highlands (Altiplano Cundiboyacense) of the Co ...

from the city with the same name, presently known as

Duitama Duitama () is a city and municipality in the department of Boyacá. It's the capital of the Tundama Province. Duitama is located northeast of Bogotá, the capital of Colombia and northeast of Tunja, the capital of Boyacá. In 2023 Duitama had ...

. The inhabitants of Soatá are descendants of a mix of Muisca, Caribbean and Choques. Modern Soatá was founded by sergeant Juan Rodríguez Parra in 1545.

Demographics and geography

In 2005 Soatá had a population of 8.730 inhabitants of which 63% living in the urban zone and 47% live in the eight subdivisions that comprise the rural area. The subdivisions (''veredas'') are: Los Molinos, La Laguna, Llano Grande, El Espinal, La Chorrera and La Costa. The urban center of Soatá is located at an elevation of above sea level.

Economy

Its economy is of subsistence and it characterizes by

agriculture Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

and the cattle ranch in form of minifundios, standing out the cultures of the

sugar cane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of 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 stout, jointed, fib ...

coffee Coffee is a beverage brewed from roasted, ground coffee beans. Darkly colored, bitter, and slightly acidic, coffee has a stimulating effect on humans, primarily due to its caffeine content, but decaffeinated coffee is also commercially a ...

tobacco Tobacco is the common name of several plants in the genus '' Nicotiana'' of the family Solanaceae, and the general term for any product prepared from the cured leaves of these plants. More than 70 species of tobacco are known, but the ...

tomato The tomato (, ), ''Solanum lycopersicum'', is a plant whose fruit is an edible Berry (botany), berry that is eaten as a vegetable. The tomato is a member of the nightshade family that includes tobacco, potato, and chili peppers. It originate ...

es,

maize Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago from wild teosinte. Native American ...

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

barley Barley (), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains; it was domesticated in the Fertile Crescent around 9000 BC, giving it nonshattering spikele ...

, fruit trees, dates and flowers. The cattle sector is distinguished by the presence of goat, pigs and cows. In the industrial sector, one stands out the production of bricks, floor pieces, canvas shoes, straw hats, panela and bee honey; it excels the elaboration of candies and treats. The production of dates has gained Soatá the title of ''city of the date palm of Colombia''. Soatá counts on tourist potential by the wealth of its cultural expressions, standing out its gastronomy, natural variety of landscapes and scenic places.

Paleontology

In the

Soatá Formation The Soatá Formation () is a formation (geology), geological formation of the northern Altiplano Cundiboyacense, Cordillera Oriental (Colombia), Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes. The formation consists mainly of shales with conglomerate (geo ...

, a brown

shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of Clay mineral, clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g., Kaolinite, kaolin, aluminium, Al2Silicon, Si2Oxygen, O5(hydroxide, OH)4) and tiny f ...

and

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility. Although its permeabil ...

sequence defined in and named after Soatá, fossil remains of the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

genera ''

Neochoerus ''Neochoerus'' ("new hog") is an extinct genus of rodent closely related to the living capybara. Fossil remains of ''Neochoerus'' have been found through North America (Mexico and United States) and South America in Boyacá, Colombia ...

'', '' Odocoileus'' and the species '' Haplomastodon waringi'' have been found.Soatá in the Paleobiology Database
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Tourism

Touristic sites of Soatá are: *

Chicamocha Canyon The Chicamocha Canyon ( , ) is a steep sided canyon carved by the Chicamocha River in Colombia. With a maximum depth of , an area of and a length of , the canyon is the second-largest worldwide. The canyon is situated in the departments of Bo ...

* Pinzón Bridge * El Chorro Soatá is becoming a popular destination for birders, as a number of Colombian

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

species can be found in the area, including Chestnut-bellied hummingbird, Niceforo's wren,

Colombian mountain grackle The Colombian mountain grackle (''Macroagelaius subalaris''), is a species of bird in the family Icteridae. Distribution and habitat It is endemic to Colombia where its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. Conservat ...

and Apical flycatcher.

Related to Soatá

* Cayo Leonidas Peñuela * Lorenzo Cárdenas

Festivals

* Our Lady of Mount Carmel Festival * Torbellino's Festival

Gallery

File:Parque Principal del Municipio de Soatá.jpg, Central square File:Iglesia de Soata.JPG, Church of Soatá File:Catedral de Soatá (Simón Bolivar).jpg, Cathedral File:Capilla de la Virgen de la Piedra.jpg, Chapel File:Cañón del Río Chicamocha en Soatá.jpg, View of

File:Vista de Soatá desde la vereda El Hatillo.jpg, View of Soatá File:Soatá y alrededores.JPG, Soatá and surroundings File:Orquideasoata.jpg, Orchid in Soatá

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Soata, Boyaca Municipalities of Boyacá Department Populated places established in 1545 1545 establishments in the Spanish Empire