Spanish America, Vol. 1 (of 2)

by Sir Richard Henry Bonnycastle

At Santa Fé de Bogota, the capital, besides the royal audience, there is a treasury, a tribunal of accounts, a royal mint, with many other judicial and state offices; the court of the royal audience is formed of five supreme judges, a fiscal, a protector of the Indians, and numerous subordinate officers. Santa Fé is also an archbishopric, founded in 1562, having Popayan and Carthagena as suffragans. This archbishopric is of great importance, the viceroyalty having been occasionally confided to its jurisdiction both in civil and religious matters. The president of the royal audience of Quito is governor of all the southern provinces, and is subordinate only to the viceroy.

Of the commerce of the viceroyalties in South America, we have very little correct information; the value of the import trade of New Granada has been stated as amounting to 1,235,000l. sterling, and its agricultural produce at 433,330l. The greatest revenue which the mother country receives during the most plentiful times, and when the mines are in the highest state of activity, amounts only to 108,330l.; but very frequently the expences of the administration render it impossible to remit even this small sum.

The gross revenue does not exceed 823,340l., as the contraband trade greatly injures the receipts of the customs in this kingdom; the vicinity of powerful neighbours who are all of great mercantile spirit, renders it utterly impossible for the agents of the government to check this traffic altogether. The Portuguese goods are poured in from their frontier by the great rivers; the British from the West India islands, and from Guiana; and thus, even before the present unhappy struggle, the existence of the viceroyalty depended entirely on the produce of the mines and of some few manufactures, with the native products which Europe could not dispense with. The manufactures are of utility only in its internal trade, and consist chiefly of carpets, cotton cloths, blankets, woollens, counterpanes, &c. The natural productions are the excellent dye-woods of the northern shore, which are reckoned even superior to those of Yucatan, timber for ship building, the mahogany of Panama, better and more beautiful than that of Guatimala or New Spain, chocolate and cacao, from the borders of the great river Magdalena, and the marshes of Guayaquil; excellent cotton, some tobacco, cochineal, coffee, and medicinal drugs, amongst which are the celebrated cinchona, or Jesuits bark, and contrayerva.

The mines of New Granada are however the objects of the greatest importance to its commerce. It may be said, that this kingdom is as rich in mineral treasures as any of the Spanish transatlantic colonies. In the provinces of Antioquia and Choco, it is alone richer in gold than any other, and the silver procured here is remarkably pure; lead and copper are also found, but little sought after; emeralds and other precious stones are sent to Europe. Platina, that valuable metal, was long thought to be peculiar to the province of Choco. Mercury, so useful in a mining country, has been lately discovered to exist in the province of Antioquia, in the valley de Santa Rosa, in the mountains of Quindiu, and near the village of Cuença, in the province of Quito. Salt is obtained in great quantity, and the kingdom produces many other valuable mineral substances.

Cassava or manioc root, and maize, form the bread of the Indians. European wheat is cultivated by the Spaniards and their descendants, and the tropical and European plants and vegetables are produced in as much abundance as they are in New Spain. The rivers and lakes are well stored with fish, and the woods and plains with game. The animals are such as are common to all South America, and will be noticed in the provincial descriptions; in this kingdom the inhabitants breed immense numbers of horses and mules, which they sell in Peru.

The native Indians are divided into numerous tribes, which inhabit the provinces, and the widespread forests and savannahs, between the Andes and the Portuguese dominions. When this country was first conquered by Benalcazar and Ximenes de Quesada, they were very numerous, and those who inhabited the ridges of the Andes were nearly as far advanced in improvement and civilization, as the Mexicans and Peruvians; from both of whom they were however totally distinct, being unknown to the former, and but recently subjugated by the latter. They defended themselves with great perseverance and resolution against the Spaniards, and it was very long before they were totally subdued.

Of all the tribes who then inhabited this country, the people of Quito and the Moscas, or Muyscas, were the most civilised and the most numerous. The traditions of the Muyscas reached to very early ages, and the most remarkable point in their history was the mysterious appearance of their great legislator Bochica, son of the Sun, who came suddenly amongst them whilst they were disputing about who should be their king. He is represented as a white man, clothed in long garments, with a venerable beard, who having patiently listened to the contending parties, advised them to choose Huncahua, which they accordingly did; and this chief subdued the country extending from the plains of San Juan, to the mountains of Opon. Bochica lived amongst them two thousand years, and then suddenly disappeared near the town called Hunca, since named by the Spaniards, Tunja. The kingdom of Huncahua was called Cundinamarca, and the ruler had the title of zaque, analogous to that of inca among the Peruvians; but the high priest who succeeded Bochica was in fact the supreme governor; and his authority has aptly been compared to that of the Tartarian Lama. The other princes, or chiefs of tributary tribes were called zippas. Bochica invented the calendar of the Muyscas, and regulated all their festival; he divided the day and night into four parts. Their week he made of three days, and the year was separated into moons; the common year consisting of twenty moons, whilst that of the priests, by which the festivals were regulated, contained thirty-seven; and twenty years formed a cycle.

The language of the Muyscas, which has been grammaticized by Bernardo de Luga, is now nearly extinct. It is called the Chibcha, and has neither the l or d; its chief characteristic being the frequent repetition of the syllables, cha, che, chu; they had words to express the ten numerals, beyond which they added the word foot, (counting by the toes in addition).

These people were sanguinary in their worship of Bochica and the gods. At the end of every fifteen years, they sacrificed a boy, who had been previously educated in the chief temple until he was fifteen. On this occasion, the priests led the victim with much ceremony to a column erected in a sacred spot, to which they bound him, and in the presence of the assembled nation, he was dispatched by the arrows of the warriors, after which, his heart was torn out, and offered on the altars of Bochica.

They appear to have known the use of a rude sort of dial, by the columns which were erected in various places, and to one of which, the boy victim was always attached; they had also attained some knowledge in sculpture, as their calendar was engraved on a stone, and other specimens of the progress they had made in this art have been occasionally found.