page_title: Muisca mummification
section_title: Social classes
hierarchical_section_title: Muisca mummification / Description / Social classes
caption_attribution_description: Muisca's Sun Temple Reconstruction at the Archaeological Museum of Sogamoso, Colombia
context_page_description: The Muisca inhabited the Altiplano Cundiboyacense in the Colombian Andes before the arrival of the Spanish and were an advanced civilisation. They mummified the higher social class members of their society, mainly the zipas, zaques, caciques, priests and their families. The mummies would be placed in caves or in dedicated houses and were not buried.
  Many mummies from the Chibcha-speaking indigenous groups have been found to date, mainly from the Muisca, Lache and Guane. In 1602 the early Spanish colonisers found 150 mummies in a cave near Suesca, that were organised in a scenic circular shape with the mummy of the cacique in the centre of the scene. The mummies were surrounded by cloths and pots. In 2007 the mummy of a baby was discovered in a cave near Gámeza, Boyacá, together with a small bowl, a pacifier and cotton cloths. The process of mummification continued into the colonial period. The youngest mummies have been dated to second half of the 18th century.
  The early Spanish chroniclers Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, Pedro Simón, Pedro de Aguado, Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés and others have provided the first historical data on the Muisca mummies.
context_section_description: Although the Muisca society was generally egalitarian, differences in the burial processes indicate the distinction of the social classes. The higher class people and their families were mummified while lower classes were not. The zipa and zaque mummy sites, often in temples and caves, were decorated with golden stools and guarded by the priests. The caciques were put together with their slaves and wives and the priests (xeques) were placed in secret sites. Often the mummies of the caciques were kept in their own houses and the religious people consulted their ancestors in their prayers to them. In some cases special bohíos were constructed to house the mummies of the highest classes, as mausoleums.
caption: When the Spanish entered the sacred Sun Temple of Sogamoso in September 1537, they found mummies sitting on elevated platforms inside
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