Altiplano Cundiboyacense in the context of Chiquinquirá

Bogotá (/ˌboʊɡəˈtɑː/, also UK: /ˌbɒɡ-/, US: /ˈboʊɡətɑː/, Spanish pronunciation: [boɣoˈta] ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (Spanish: [ˌsanta ˈfe ðe βoɣoˈta]; lit. 'Holy Faith of Bogotá') during the Spanish Imperial period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital and largest city of Colombia. The city is administered as the Capital District, as well as the capital of, though not politically part of, the surrounding department of Cundinamarca. Bogotá is a territorial entity of the first order, with the same administrative status as the departments of Colombia. It is the main political, economic, administrative, industrial, cultural, aeronautical, technological, scientific, medical and educational center of the country and northern South America.

Bogotá was founded as the capital of the New Kingdom of Granada on 6 August 1538 by Spanish conquistador Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada after a harsh expedition into the Andes conquering the Muisca, the indigenous inhabitants of the Altiplano. Santafé (its name after 1540) became the seat of the government of the Spanish Royal Audiencia of the New Kingdom of Granada (created in 1550), and then after 1717 it was the capital of the Viceroyalty of New Granada. After the Battle of Boyacá on 7 August 1819, Bogotá became the capital of the independent nation of Gran Colombia. It was Simón Bolívar who rebaptized the city with the name of Bogotá, as a way of honoring the Muisca people and as an emancipation act towards the Spanish crown. Hence, since the Viceroyalty of New Granada's independence from the Spanish Empire and during the formation of present-day Colombia, Bogotá has remained the capital of this territory.

The Spanish conquest of the Muisca took place from 1537 to 1540. The Muisca were the inhabitants of the central Andean highlands of Colombia before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors. They were organised in a loose confederation of different rulers; the psihipqua of Muyquytá, with his headquarters in Funza, the hoa of Hunza, the iraca of the sacred City of the Sun Sugamuxi, the Tundama of Tundama, and several other independent caciques. The most important rulers at the time of the conquest were psihipqua Tisquesusa, hoa Eucaneme, iraca Sugamuxi and Tundama in the northernmost portion of their territories. The Muisca were organised in small communities of circular enclosures (ca in their language Muysccubbun; literally "language of the people"), with a central square where the bohío of the cacique was located. They were called "Salt People" because of their extraction of salt in various locations throughout their territories, mainly in Zipaquirá, Nemocón, and Tausa. For the main part self-sufficient in their well-organised economy, the Muisca traded with the European conquistadors valuable products as gold, tumbaga (a copper-silver-gold alloy), and emeralds with their neighbouring indigenous groups. In the Tenza Valley, to the east of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense where the majority of the Muisca lived, they extracted emeralds in Chivor and Somondoco. The economy of the Muisca was rooted in their agriculture with main products maize, yuca, potatoes, and various other cultivations elaborated on elevated fields (in their language called tá). Agriculture had started around 3000 BCE on the Altiplano, following the preceramic Herrera Period and a long epoch of hunter-gatherers since the late Pleistocene. The earliest archaeological evidence of inhabitation in Colombia, and one of the oldest in South America, has been found in El Abra, dating to around 12,500 years BP.

The main part of the Muisca civilisation was concentrated on the Bogotá savanna, a flat high plain in the Eastern Ranges of the Andes, far away from the Caribbean coast. The savanna was an ancient lake, that existed until the latest Pleistocene and formed a highly fertile soil for their agriculture. The Muisca were a deeply religious civilisation with a polytheistic society and an advanced astronomical knowledge, which was represented in their complex lunisolar calendar. Men and women had specific and different tasks in their relatively egalitarian society; while the women took care of the sowing, preparation of food, the extraction of salt, and the elaboration of mantles and pottery, the men were assigned to harvesting, warfare, and hunting. The guecha warriors were tasked with the defence of the Muisca territories, mainly against their western neighbours; the Muzo ("Emerald People") and the bellicose Panche. To impress their enemies, the Muisca warriors wore mummies of important ancestors on their backs, while fighting. In their battles, the men used spears, poisoned arrows, and golden knives.

The Muisca (also called the Chibcha) were a pre-Columbian culture and colonial communities of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense before the Spanish colonization of the Americas, whose customs lasted up the beginning of the 19th century and Colombian independence, and are indigenous peoples in Colombia in a process of cultural re-definition and revitalization. The Muisca spoke Muysccubun, a language of the Chibchan language family, also called Muysca and Mosca, which is part of an important revival effort. The first known contact with Europeans in the region was in 1537 during the Spanish conquest of New Granada.

In New Spain, Spanish clerics and civil officials had a major impact on the Muisca, attempting to Christianize and incorporate them into the Spanish Empire as subjects.

The Chibchan languages (also known as Chibchano) is a language family indigenous to the Isthmo-Colombian Area, a geo-cultural region extending from Mosquitia in eastern Central America to northern Colombia, and encompassing parts of Costa Rica and Panama. The name is derives from the now-extinct Chibcha or Muisca language, once spoken on the Altiplano Cundiboyacense present day Colombia. Recent genetic and linguistic evidence now indicate that the original nucleus of Chibchan languages and peoples might not have been in Colombia, but along the south-eastern coast of Mosquitia, where the greatest diversity of Chibchan languages has been identified.

El Dorado (Spanish: [el doˈɾaðo]) is a mythical city of gold supposedly located somewhere in South America. The king of this city was said to be so rich that he would cover himself from head to foot in gold dust – either daily or on certain ceremonial occasions – before diving into a sacred lake to wash it off. The legend was first recorded in the 16th century by Spanish colonists in the Americas; they referred to the king as el Dorado, the Golden One, a name which eventually came to be applied to the city itself.

The legend is inspired by the culture of the Muisca, an indigenous people who inhabited a plateau in the Andean Mountains range in present-day Colombia. Each time a new leader or Zipa was crowned, his body was covered in gold dust and offerings were transported along to the depths of Lake Guatavita, invoking the goddess who inhabited the lake. This ritual is known as the Muisca Golden Ceremony.

Muisca Confederations were loose confederations of different Muisca chiefdoms in the Eastern Andean highlands of what is today Colombia before the Spanish conquest of northern South America. These unions, centred around main chiefdoms recognised by smaller ones, were not a single, even loose, muisca confederation of chiefdoms, but multiple, independent regional entities. The area, presently called Altiplano Cundiboyacense, comprised the current departments of Boyacá, Cundinamarca and minor parts of Santander.

Usually, Muisca chiefdoms were composed of various basic matrilineal units (uta, minor, or sibyn, major) called capitanías by the Spaniards. However, power was based on individual alliances of Muisca rulers with households or basic units. Often, sibyn were villages and uta groups of houses. Four confederations of chiefdoms formed in Muisca territory: Bogotá, Tunja, Duitama and Sogamoso. Additionally, the Chibcha-speaking Guane and Lache were also ruled by the confederation of Guanentá and the confederation of El Cocuy respectively. Different models exist to explain the nature of power among Muisca elites.