Quimbaya

The goldsmiths of the Early Quimbaya period (1st - 10th centuries AD) created a naturalistic art form on the temperate slopes bordering the river Cauca. Their poporos were inspired by plant forms; others are portraits with calm faces and stately postures, inside which fragments of calcined bones have been found. These masters of lost wax casting modelled their pieces in beeswax and covered them with clay, so that when the mould was heated the wax left its form on the inside. The gold-copper alloy tumbaga, poured into the mould, took on the same shape as the wax model.

Towards the 10th century AD the middle Cauca valley was occupied by other communities who survived until the Spanish conquest. Living in villages of circular houses, they buried their dead in large cemeteries. The ornaments of the Late Quimbaya period are of gold and copper in simple forms, very widely used.

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