Villa de Leyva, Historical and geological evolution: The Invisible Frontier

Many people have wondered what is so magical, wonderful or different about this place under the sun called Villa de Leyva. First of all, not everyone has the opportunity to live next to a sacred mountain that was the cradle of humanity as in the Mwiska mythology, such mountain was Iguaque, where there is a lagoon of the same name.

The Mwiskas were the first inhabitants of this valley. They came from millenary Asian migrations that entered through the Bering Strait to what would later be called America. Here they settled and created a complex and advanced civilization, with expert potters and goldsmiths, they created a whole sociopolitical system, with their own laws and rules of social organization and populated the entire Cundinamarca-Boyacá savannah, located in a plain with an average altitude of 2600 meters, where they dedicated themselves to agriculture, the worship of their gods, observing the constellations, creating their own calendar and system of base 20 numbers. Each number, in addition to being a number, had a special symbolism in their calligraphy and represented events of their cosmogony

"Good land, good land!

Land that puts an end to our sorrow".

...rejoiced Juan de Castellanos and with him all the soldiers of Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, survivors of the plagues of the Magdalena jungle and of the poisoned arrows, when they reached the high plateaus of the Andes. If we take a look at the buildings of the town we will see that they resemble those of colonial Spain. The name of this city is a Spanish name "Santa María de Leyva"...

The city was founded in 1472, it has a church, colonial architecture and Spanish is spoken here, but before that date there was another history since these lands were part of the Mwiska Empire.

The name of this department, Boyacá, comes from the Mwiska language, it means "land of the royal blanket", so welcome to the "land of the royal blanket" as well. Weaving was very important to the Mwiskas, and besides, high up in the mountains it is very cold, so you will understand why the Mwiskas needed "royal blankets" in this land. We still need them today, and they are called ruanas and you may know them by the name of "ponchos".

The valley in which we find ourselves was called by the Muiscas "Zaquencipá", which means "city of the zaque" or city of the ruler. The nearby hill of Iguaque is now a natural reserve, but in Mwiska times it was a sacred place, somehow equivalent to the paradise of the Christian religion. For the Mwiskas, humanity was created at Iguaque, and humans came from a lake there.

You may wonder who Iguaque was. Iguaque was a 3-year-old boy who one day came out of a lake with Bachué, a mythical woman, the first woman.

When the boy grew up, Bachué and Iguaque married, and all the mwiskas were their descendants.

When the two were very old, they summoned all their descendants to a great gathering on the shores of Lake Iguaque. There, Bachué gave them his last words of advice. She exhorted them to live in peace and harmony with each other. When she finished giving her advice, she and her husband transformed themselves into large snakes and swam toward the lake.

Before the arrival of the Spaniards, a very different world existed here, completely different from the present one. There was an astronomical observatory, which is now 2200 years old, yes from the stone age, because it was composed of large stones facing the sky and the stars. What is left of it is not far from here.

The curious thing is that it was made up of large stone phalluses, some say they were part of the observatory, others say they were part of a fertility cult. Its name, the "Infiernito" was given to this place by the Spaniards, for whom these stone sculptures could only be the work of the devil.

When we look at cultures around the world, strange things happen, cult objects that belong to a culture, from the point of view of another culture can be something evil. So it was, that many of these sculptures were transformed into columns to build a church or a building. If one stops in the Plaza Mayor of Villa de Leyva and observes the building with many arches on one side of the Plaza, not far from the church, one would never suspect that its columns were taken from the so-called "little hell", altered and converted into the base of a Spanish-looking building.

What was left of the Stone Age astronomical observatory besides some scattered stones and the "evil phalluses"? Something that, although apparently no one could take away, has gradually disappeared in the big cities: The vision of the sky, of the heavens, of the constellations, of the Universe itself, of the origin of life.

There are certain places on the planet that offer a unique view of the universe that surrounds us, among them Villa de Leyva, so it was no coincidence that more than 2200 years ago there was an astronomical observatory here.

I remember 20 years ago when I saw the Milky Way for the first time in my life, it was right here in Villa de Leyva.

I finally knew why it had that name. It seemed as if Bachué's mother's milk was spilling into the sky. However, times have changed.

against all odds could be taken away, light and atmospheric pollution, little by little are stealing the Milky Way, our visual contact with the universe is slowly disappearing. But if you look at the night sky, far away from the city, maybe you will have a beautiful view and observe a piece of the Milky Way right here.

This is what Villa de Leyva was like a few thousand years ago, but what was this place like not only thousands of years ago, but millions of years ago?

Villa de Leyva was a great sea, as was much of Colombia, a great sea that reached all the way to the Amazon jungle, the rainforest. By one of those strange geological coincidences, many of the marine creatures appeared fossilized in Villa de Leyva, many more were buried forever under mountains and rocks in the rest of the country.

Imagine living 2,200 years ago in this area and suddenly from out of mother earth appeared a fantastic stone creature that had nothing to do with any known living being, the scene was almost perfect, above, the sky, full of mysteries and changing constellations and from the center of the earth strange fish, plants and fossilized marine animals. In one place under the Sun, the Earth and the universe had magically come together, the history of the universe as seen in the sky and the past of the planet as born from Mother Earth in the form of fossilized creatures: There was a coincidence between the Earth and the heavens, the people were then part of the Earth and the Universe, and they were trying to find out why they were here, and they learned to farm

and to take care of Mother Earth. Water for them was the origin of life itself... and there were sacred mountains and lakes....

I believe that what I am going to tell you now, like all myths, must have some truth in it. Many writers, artists, thinkers, poets, dreamers, for one reason or another have come to live in this Villa, to share their works of poetry, pottery, thought and to share their thirst for knowledge.

There was a Colombian anthropologist, of Austrian origin who once said:

"Anyway, there is a place, when I approach Villa de Leyva, that I feel that I am crossing an invisible line and suddenly, irresistibly, I am entering another dimension of my existence."

What is the mystery behind this sensation?

Some people claim that Villa de Leyva was built on an immense quartz, hence the sensation of PEACE that people say they feel when entering its boundaries. Some astronomers say that the effect of the quartz is created by the sky itself, the constellations forming a hexagon in Villa de Leyva, with Orion at its center.

Now, it is up to you to interpret how you felt before and how you feel now, as you cross this virtual border, which some say comes from the sky, others from Earth, but without a doubt we all feel it here in our hearts.

Let's jump a million years into the future and I will tell what we are seeing here today: The original inhabitants of these lands disappeared for the most part by acts of colonialism, their language was forgotten, their respect for nature was forbidden, and those who remained became peasants, and were made to forget their gods, their ways of life and their origins.

With the arrival of the Spanish Empire, this fertile "land of the sacred blanket" began to become a desert. Trees were cut down, mountains were planted with imported crops and the people became slaves in their own land. In modern times things got worse, Villa de Leyva has been literally invaded by people from the city, in search of PEACE and tranquility, bringing with them noise and pollution.

But, don't get me wrong, this is not a political speech, I could not inspire you to think about heaven and earth if I didn't tell you now what is happening in real life. I think you will have seen it already in many other places.

The good news is that among all the suffering and all the war of the last 60 years in Colombia, Villa de Leyva is an example of PEACE. It is a safe city to walk around at night, children can walk from home to school without an escort, and girls and boys do not have to be afraid when they finish their music lessons and go home.

The crime rate here is very low and people tend to die of old age? Perhaps Villa de Leyva is really located in a privileged place under the stars or on Earth. Its magic is always present, once you cross that invisible line that divides the places of this Earth, you really feel that something has changed in your body and mind.... Maybe the voices of the past are still heard here or maybe we are listening to the waves of the ancient oceans that became a gigantic rock with animals and plants included.

I think the best way to be here in this little spot under Orion and the Milky Way is to feel the cosmic energy, looking at the Night Sky and asking ourselves, where are we and why are we here, as the ancients did? Then we feel this communion with the universe. The same I felt 20 years ago when I saw the Milky Way, for the first time in my life, I learned that I was part of the Universe and the Universe was part of me.

Maybe, being here will give you a new vision about the Universe, about this small planet we call home, and the importance of taking care of this Earth as our ancestors did... after all they had a reason to do it... they were in touch with the Earth and the sky.

But, what if for a small moment of time, that one that happens between two heartbeats, we decide to put aside all our preconceptions of the world and listen to the message of Mother Earth and the Universe.... a message that has been waiting to be heard for thousands or millions of years, and we realize that we have crossed that invisible border where we find PEACE and harmony between us and with nature, and moreover not only that we have crossed that border, but that the border has crossed us... and that when we leave this place, we can take with us all its energy, its beauty... and help many more people of the Earth to cross that invisible border that divides us...