1.
Villa de Leyva
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Villa de Leyva, also called Villa de Leiva, is a touristic colonial town and municipality, in the Ricaurte Province, part of the Boyacá department of Colombia. The town is located 37 kilometres west of the departmental capital Tunja and it is three and a half hours by car or bus from Bogotá. Located away from trade routes in a high altitude valley of semi-desert terrain, and with no mineral deposits nearby to exploit. This has resulted in Villa de Leyva becoming one of Colombias principal tourist attractions, the town and the surrounding countryside, which contains several sites of interest, are popular weekend destinations for citizens of Bogota, and attract an increasing number of foreign tourists. The urban centre of Villa de Leyva is located in a valley on the Altiplano Cundiboyacense at 2,149 metres. The area of Villa de Leyva was inhabited early in the inhabitation of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, the earliest archaeological evidence has been surfaced around El Infiernito, an archeoastronomical site dating back to pre-Herrera times. The Muisca were the inhabitants of the area at the time of the Spanish conquest, the town was founded on June 12,1572 by and named after the first president of the New Kingdom of Granada, Andrés Díaz Venero de Leiva. The focus of the town is the Plaza Mayor, which at 14,000 square meters is the largest square in Colombia and believed to be the largest entirely cobbled square in South America. The towns most famous son is Antonio Ricaurte, a captain in Simon Bolivars army fighting for independence, the house in which he was born, on the Plazuela de San Agustín, was acquired by Colombias Air Force in 1977 and turned into a military museum. Villa de Leyva has also been home to two other figures in Colombian history. Antonio Nariño, best known for translating The Rights of Man into Spanish, luis Alberto Acuña, one of the most important Colombian artists of the 20th century, also spent his final years in the town. The houses of men are now museums containing their personal properties, and in the case of Acuña. The House of the First Congress, where the First Congress of the United Provinces of Nueva Granada met on October 4,1812, is located on the corner of the main plaza. It is currently the site of the municipal council, near Villa de Leyva are several other sites of interest
2.
Viceroyalty of New Granada
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The Viceroyalty of New Granada was the name given on 27 May 1717, to the jurisdiction of the Spanish Empire in northern South America, corresponding to modern Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, and Venezuela. The territory corresponding to Panama was incorporated later in 1739, in addition to these core areas, the territory of the Viceroyalty of New Granada included Guyana, southwestern Suriname, parts of northwestern Brazil, and northern Peru. Sporadic attempts at reform were directed at increasing efficiency and centralizing authority, the rough and diverse geography of northern South America and the limited range of proper roads made travel and communications within the viceroyalty difficult. The Wayuu had never subjugated by the Spanish. The two groups were in a more or less permanent state of war, there had been rebellions in 1701,1727,1741,1757,1761 and 1768. In 1718, Governor Soto de Herrera called them barbarians, horse thieves, worthy of death, without God, without law, of all the Indians in the territory of Colombia, the Wayuu were unique in having learned the use of firearms and horses. In 1769 the Spanish took 22 Wayuus captive, in order to put them to work building the fortifications of Cartagena, the reaction of the Wayuus was unexpected. On 2 May 1769, at El Rincón, near Riohacha, they set their village afire, burning the church, the Spanish immediately dispatched an expedition from El Rincón to capture the Wayuus. At the head of this force was José Antonio de Sierra, the Guajiros recognized him and forced his party to take refuge in the house of the curate, which they then set afire. Sierra and eight of his men were killed and this success was soon known in other Guajiro areas, and more men joined the revolt. According to Messía, at the peak there were 20,000 Wayuus under arms, many had firearms acquired from English and Dutch smugglers, sometimes even from the Spanish. This enabled the rebels to take all the settlements of the region. According to the authorities, more than 100 Spaniards were killed, many cattle were also taken by the rebels. The Spaniards took refuge in Riohacha and sent urgent messages to Maracaibo, Valledupar, Santa Marta and Cartagena, the rebels themselves were not unified. Sierras relatives among the Indians took up arms against the rebels to avenge his death, a battle between the two groups of Wayuus was fought at La Soledad. That and the arrival of the Spanish reinforcements caused the rebellion to fade away, New Granada was estimated to have 4,345,000 inhabitants in 1819. With the dissolution of Gran Colombia, the states of Ecuador, Venezuela, the Republic of New Granada, with its capital at Bogotá, lasted from 1831 to 1856. The name Colombia reappeared in the United States of Colombia, the new name for the country having been introduced by a government after a civil war
3.
Aragua
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Aragua State is located in the north-central region of Venezuela. It has plains and jungles and Caribbean beaches, the most popular are Cata and Choroni. It has Venezuelas first national park which is called Henri Pittier, the capital is Maracay, other important cities include Turmero and El Limón. Aragua State covers a surface area of 7,014 km² and, based on the 2011 census information. The name Aragua is said to derive from a Cumanagota word for a type of palm, Aragua was part of the Province of Caracas until 1848, when the Province was split into three parts, one being Aragua Province. The Province became a state in 1864, some mergers and demergers with other states followed, until Aragua became an autonomous state again in 1901. Its capital until 1917 was La Victoria, when the capital was moved to Maracay, Aragua borders the Caribbean Sea to the north, with its coastline backed by the fast-rising central Cordillera mountain range. Codazzi Peak reaches over 2400 m above sea level, much of the rest of the state is made up of fertile valleys used for intensive agriculture, apart from in the extreme south where the flats of the central Llanos region begin. On the western border is Lake Valencia, the main rivers in the state are the Aragua, the Guárico, the El Limón, the Tuy, the Pao and the Turmero. They flow into the Caribbean Sea, Lake Valencia, or feed the vast Orinoco River network, the Camatagua reservoir is one of the main reservoirs supplying Caracas. Since 2008 the governor is Rafael Isea for the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, the Tigres de Aragua, a team of the Venezuelan Professional Baseball League, represents the state and plays in Maracay. States of Venezuela Dancing devils of Corpus Christi Ciudad Maracay, information about Maracay and Aragua State INE, Population statistics for Aragua
4.
Venezuela
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Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a federal republic located on the northern coast of South America. It is bordered by Colombia on the west, Brazil on the south, Guyana on the east, Venezuela covers 916,445 km2 and has an estimated population of 31775371. The territory now known as Venezuela was colonized by Spain in 1522 amid resistance from indigenous peoples and it gained full independence as a separate country in 1830. During the 19th century, Venezuela suffered political turmoil and autocracy, since 1958, the country has had a series of democratic governments. This new constitution changed the name of the country to República Bolivariana de Venezuela. Venezuela is a presidential republic consisting of 23 states, the Capital District. Venezuela also claims all Guyanese territory west of the Essequibo River, oil was discovered in the early 20th century, and Venezuela has the worlds largest known oil reserves and has been one of the worlds leading exporters of oil. Previously an underdeveloped exporter of commodities such as coffee and cocoa, oil quickly came to dominate exports. The recovery of oil prices in the early 2000s gave Venezuela oil funds not seen since the 1980s, the Venezuelan government then established populist policies that initially boosted the Venezuelan economy and increased social spending, significantly reducing economic inequality and poverty. However, such policies later became controversial since they destabilized the economy, resulting in hyperinflation, an economic depression. According to the most popular and accepted version, in 1499, the stilt houses in the area of Lake Maracaibo reminded the navigator, Amerigo Vespucci, of the city of Venice, so he named the region Veneziola Piccola Venezia. The name acquired its current spelling as a result of Spanish influence, where the suffix -uela is used as a term, thus. The German language 16th century-term for the area, Klein-Venedig, also means little Venice, however, Martín Fernández de Enciso, a member of the Vespucci and Ojeda crew, gave a different account. In his work Summa de geografía, he states that they found people who called themselves the Veneciuela. Thus, the name Venezuela may have evolved from the native word and it is not known how many people lived in Venezuela before the Spanish conquest, it has been estimated at around one million. In addition to indigenous peoples known today, the population included historic groups such as the Kalina, Auaké, Caquetio, Mariche, the Timoto-Cuica culture was the most complex society in Pre-Columbian Venezuela, with pre-planned permanent villages, surrounded by irrigated, terraced fields. They also stored water in tanks and their houses were made primarily of stone and wood with thatched roofs. They were peaceful, for the most part, and depended on growing crops, regional crops included potatoes and ullucos
5.
Colombia
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Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a transcontinental country largely situated in the northwest of South America, with territories in Central America. Colombia shares a border to the northwest with Panama, to the east with Venezuela and Brazil and to the south with Ecuador and it shares its maritime limits with Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Jamaica, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. It is a unitary, constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments, the territory of what is now Colombia was originally inhabited by indigenous peoples including the Muisca, the Quimbaya and the Tairona. The Spanish arrived in 1499 and initiated a period of conquest and colonization ultimately creating the Viceroyalty of New Granada, independence from Spain was won in 1819, but by 1830 the Gran Colombia Federation was dissolved. What is now Colombia and Panama emerged as the Republic of New Granada, the new nation experimented with federalism as the Granadine Confederation, and then the United States of Colombia, before the Republic of Colombia was finally declared in 1886. Since the 1960s the country has suffered from an asymmetric low-intensity armed conflict, Colombia is one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse countries in the world, and thereby possesses a rich cultural heritage. Cultural diversity has also influenced by Colombias varied geography. The urban centres are located in the highlands of the Andes mountains. Colombian territory also encompasses Amazon rainforest, tropical grassland and both Caribbean and Pacific coastlines, ecologically, it is one of the worlds 17 megadiverse countries, and the most densely biodiverse of these per square kilometer. Colombia is a power and a regional actor with the fourth-largest economy in Latin America, is part of the CIVETS group of six leading emerging markets and is an accessing member to the OECD. Colombia has an economy with macroeconomic stability and favorable growth prospects in the long run. The name Colombia is derived from the last name of Christopher Columbus and it was conceived by the Venezuelan revolutionary Francisco de Miranda as a reference to all the New World, but especially to those portions under Spanish and Portuguese rule. The name was adopted by the Republic of Colombia of 1819. When Venezuela, Ecuador and Cundinamarca came to exist as independent states, New Granada officially changed its name in 1858 to the Granadine Confederation. In 1863 the name was changed, this time to United States of Colombia. To refer to country, the Colombian government uses the terms Colombia. Owing to its location, the present territory of Colombia was a corridor of early human migration from Mesoamerica, the oldest archaeological finds are from the Pubenza and El Totumo sites in the Magdalena Valley 100 km southwest of Bogotá. These sites date from the Paleoindian period, at Puerto Hormiga and other sites, traces from the Archaic Period have been found
6.
Martyr
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A martyr is somebody who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, refusing to renounce, or refusing to advocate a belief or cause as demanded by an external party. This refusal to comply with the presented demands results in the punishment or execution of the martyr by the oppressor, originally applied only to those who suffered for their religious beliefs, the term is now often used in connection with people imprisoned or killed for espousing a political cause. Most martyrs are considered holy or are respected by their followers, becoming symbols of exceptional leadership, Martyrs play significant roles in religions. Similarly, martyrs have had effects in secular life, including specific figures such as Socrates, as well as in politics. In its original meaning, the martyr, meaning witness, was used in the secular sphere as well as in the New Testament of the Bible. The term, in this sense, entered the English language as a loanword. The death of a martyr or the value attributed to it is called martyrdom, the early Christians who first began to use the term martyr in its new sense saw Jesus as the first and greatest martyr, on account of his crucifixion. The early Christians appear to have seen Jesus as the archetypal martyr, the word martyr is used in English to describe a wide variety of people. However, the table presents a general outline of common features present in stereotypical martyrdoms. Examples of this are found in the Mahabharata, during the great war which commenced, even Arjuna was brought down with doubts, e. g. attachment, sorrow, fear. This is where Krishna instructs Arjuna how to carry out his duty as a righteous warrior, Martyrdom in Judaism is one of the main examples of Kiddush Hashem, meaning sanctification of Gods name through public dedication to Jewish practice. Religious martyrdom is considered one of the significant contributions of Hellenistic Judaism to Western Civilization. Frend, Judaism was itself a religion of martyrdom and it was this Jewish psychology of martyrdom that inspired Christian martyrdom. In Christianity, a martyr, in accordance with the meaning of the original Greek martys in the New Testament, is one who brings a testimony, in particular, the testimony is that of the Christian Gospel, or more generally, the Word of God. A Christian witness is a biblical witness whether or not death follows, however, over time many Christian testimonies were rejected, and the witnesses put to death, and the word martyr developed its present sense. Where death ensues, the follow the example of Jesus in offering up their lives for truth. The concept of Jesus as a martyr has recently received greater attention, analyses of the Gospel passion narratives have led many scholars to conclude that they are martyrdom accounts in terms of genre and style. Several scholars have concluded that Paul the Apostle understood Jesus death as a martyrdom
