by Mary Harrsch © 2025
These small geometric gold figures—called tunjos—were votive offerings crafted by the Muisca people of the high Andean plateau in present-day Colombia. They were placed in shrines, temples, and sacred lakes as offerings to deities and ancestral forces associated with water, fertility, and cosmic balance.
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| Gold geometric-type Muisca figurine north central Colombia dated between 800-1600 CE that I photographed at The Field Museum in Chicago |
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| Gold geometric-type Muisca figurine north central Colombia dated between 800-1600 CE that I photographed at The Field Museum in Chicago |
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| Gold geometric-type Muisca figurine north central Colombia dated between 800-1600 CE that I photographed at The Field Museum in Chicago |
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| Gold geometric-type Muisca figurine north central Colombia dated between 800-1600 CE that I photographed at The Field Museum in Chicago |
In the Muisca worldview, gold was not a symbol of material wealth but a sacred substance representing sunlight, vitality, and the creative energy of their gods. Their rulers acted as mediators between the human and supernatural realms, and in rituals—most famously at Lake Guatavita—gold served as a spiritual medium rather than a display of earthly power.
Muisca art is distinguished by its deliberate geometric aesthetic. Human and animal forms were intentionally abstracted into triangles, cylinders, and simplified features. This was not a technical limitation but a consistent visual language, reflecting a conceptual approach that emphasized spiritual essence over naturalistic detail.
The European legend of El Dorado, or “the Gilded One,” originated from Spanish accounts of Muisca investiture ceremonies. During these rites, a new ruler, covered in gold dust, would journey to the center of a sacred lake and submerge himself while attendants cast gold offerings into the water. Over time, Europeans transformed this ritual into a myth of a city of gold, fueling centuries of speculative maps and disastrous expeditions. In reality, its origin lies in the Muisca’s cosmological use of gold, not in vast material wealth.
To the west, in the warm river valleys of the Middle Cauca region, the Quimbaya culture developed a strikingly different artistic tradition. As master goldsmiths, they produced some of the most naturalistic human figures in ancient Colombia. Their art is characterized by rounded modeling, balanced proportions, and serene, lifelike faces, particularly seen in the famous ‘Lord in the Trance’ pendants. This naturalism reflects a worldview where the human form itself was a perfected vessel for spiritual connection. Geographically separated from the Muisca by the vast breadth of the Colombian Andes, this ecological divide helps explain their distinct artistic vision. The Quimbaya’s daily and ceremonial life was regulated by rituals like the Poporo ceremony, which maintained personal and cosmic balance. It involved chewing coca leaves to enhance the meditation and polished thought needed to establish a connection to the spiritual realm, or Aluna. For the Quimbaya, spiritual attainment was not about escaping the human form, but about achieving a state of perfected, meditative harmony within it.
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| Quimbaya figure Gold copper alloy in the collections of the Museum of the Americas in Madrid, Spain courtesy of Wikimedia Commons contributor Michel Wal |
On the Caribbean slopes of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the Tairona people (flourishing from around 450–900 CE and later) developed yet another unique goldworking tradition. In contrast to the small, geometric tunjos of the Muisca, the Tairona created larger, dynamic cast-gold pendants and figurines. These works are characterized by complex postures, elaborate body ornaments, and a powerful sense of movement. Tairona figures often display exuberant jewelry—nose rings, ear spools, pectorals, and towering headdresses—modeled with remarkable detail using the lost-wax technique.
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| Hollow gold Tumbaga pendant of a transforming shamanic female figure produced by the Tairona culture on the Caribbean slopes of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta of Colombia dated between 450-900 CE that I photographed at The Field Museum in Chicago |
While the Muisca used gold as a sacred medium for offerings, Tairona goldwork often functioned as personal regalia, worn by elites to signal rank and spiritual authority. A key feature of Tairona art is its embodiment of shamanic transformation. Figures frequently display non-human traits: wide eyes with long, horizontal pupils (signifying an animal or spirit), muzzle-like noses, beaked headdresses, and wing-like ear spools. These elements visualize a shaman caught mid-transformation, shifting between human and animal identities to communicate with the spirit world. For the Tairona, this fluidity of identity was fundamental to maintaining cosmic balance.
In summary, the goldwork of these three cultures reveals profoundly different worldviews. The Muisca favored a geometric, schematic style that emphasized social and cosmic roles. The Quimbaya produced calm, naturalistic portraits of elite individuals in a state of meditative trance. The Tairona, however, embraced an artistic vocabulary of dynamic transformation, where human forms merge with animal traits to express shamanic power. Together, they demonstrate the extraordinary diversity of artistic and spiritual expression in pre-Hispanic Colombia.
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