San Agustín culture
For its period, the San Agustín culture displays considerable development in agriculture, ceramics, goldsmithing, and sculptural art.
The site of the culture lies mostly within the Parque Arqueológico Nacional de Tierradentro and the San Agustín Archaeological Park.
The first information about the archaeological ruins of San Agustín appears in the work Wonders of Nature by the Mallorcan missionary Fray Juan de Santa Gertrudis, of the Observant Order, who visited the place several times in 1756.
The area where the Pre-Columbian relics are located corresponds to the current municipalities of San Agustín, Isnos and Saladoblanco at Huila Department.
The most outstanding lithic work is called "Fuente de Lavapatas", in the rocky bed of the ravine of the same name, where there is an elaborate ceremonial fountain with three pools and numerous serpentine and batracomorphic figures in low relief, surrounded by tiny channels through which water flows.
Located in the Municipality of Isnos, Alto de los Ídolos is the site with a great density of tombs, mounds and statues.
It is believed that it relied on farming corn, peanuts, chontaduro (Guilielma gasipaes), and cassava, in addition to fishing and hunting activities.
Their complex sculptural art, relating to cosmogonic and religious conceptions, contrasts markedly with the simple structure of their dwellings; these were circular in plan and covered with straw.
At its height, the culture was characterized by the development of lithic statuary; the construction of large embankments or terraces for the location of the necropolis; the construction of retaining walls; tombs covered with large stone slabs or artificial mounds crowned with funerary shrines; and ceremonial fountains carved into native rock.
In addition, differences in the structure of the tombs of the same site, without clear indications of a cultural sequence, suggest social stratification, since ceramics and other funerary items testify to their contemporaneity.
It is possible that the dispersion of lithic statuary in the San Agustín culture is explained by the existence of an organization structured on the basis of small family groups, linked together by religious ties.
The archeological evidence suggests that in this flourishing period of Augustinian culture, social organization was strongly influenced by warrior groups, and religious forms by solar deities and war.
More than three hundred statues have been found, most of them in an area delimited by the basins of the Magdalena, Bordones, Mazamorras and Sombrerillos rivers and the peaks of the Colombian Massif.
The blocks in which they were carved are volcanic tuffs and lava andesites, some of large dimensions, up to more than four meters high and several tons in weight.
The frequency of representation of the feline mouth in most of the sculptures is indicative of the cult of the jaguar, which seems to be one of the oldest and most widespread among the peoples that lived in the Andean area and that still persists in the aboriginal populations of the Amazon jungle.
These statues represent warriors, in a naturalistic way, adorned with special tiaras and carrying weapons: rounded throwing stones and shields.
[11] Many of the anthropomorphic figures appear naked or with only with light clothing and ornaments, such as necklaces, bracelets, nose rings and earmuffs.
This is curious, since the area of San Agustín is a region with a moderately temperate climate and this cools considerably as it ascends to the Valley of the Popes.
The culture's ceramics are fundamentally monochromatic, made in an oxidizing atmosphere, by the winding system and with engobes of different ocher tones.
The decoration is almost always incised, although negative painting also occurs, black on red, from the early phases of the culture, known as the Superior Formative.
