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Tairona

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Tairona or Tayrona was a Pre-Columbian culture of Colombia , which consisted in a group of chiefdoms in the region of Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in present-day Cesar , Magdalena and La Guajira Departments of Colombia , South America, which goes back at least to the 1st century AD and had significant demographic growth around the 11th century.

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48-524: The Tairona people formed one of the two principal linguistic groups of the Chibchan family, the other being the Muisca . Genetic and archaeological evidence shows a relatively dense occupation of the region by at least 200 BC. Pollen data compiled by Luisa Fernanda Herrera in 1980 shows considerable deforestation and the use of cultigens such as yuca and maize since possibly 1200 BC. However, occupation of

96-416: A country or during peacetime. Riots in the wake of the 2020 George Floyd protests in numerous American cities led to increased amounts of looting, as looters took advantage of the delicate political situation and civil unrest surrounding the riots themselves. Up to 175 Target stores closed Nationwide during the disturbances. During the ongoing Kashmir conflict , looting of Kashmiris trapped between

144-460: A good example being during the 1967 First Invasion of Onitsha , where the victorious Nigerian troops were encircled and annihilated while looting. In other cases, for example, the Wahhabi sack of Karbala in 1801 or 1802, loot has contributed to further victories for an army. Not all looters in wartime are conquerors; the looting of Vistula Land by the retreating Imperial Russian Army in 1915

192-609: A peak in the population. A second phase spans from 500 AD to about 900 AD; it can be called Nehuange 2, and was called Buritaca after detailed excavations by Jack Wynn in the 1970s. From c. 900 CE began what is commonly called the Tairona period, characterized by an impressive increase in the variation, size and number of ceramic forms, many conserving the styles from the Nehuange or Buritaca phases. The Tairona 1 through 3 phases, from 900 to 1650, show significant local variations. This

240-466: A result, the first contacts with the Tairona were very violent and the Spanish suffered great losses, which resulted in a more diplomatic strategy from the first governor of Santa Marta, Rodrigo de Bastidas. One of the best-known Tairona nucleated villages and archaeological sites is known as Ciudad Perdida (Spanish for "Lost City"). It was a major city, about 13 hectares (32 acres) in the "core". It

288-517: A significant increase in the looting of antiquities from archaeological sites in Egypt, as the government lost the ability to protect the sites. Other acts of modern looting, such as the looting and destruction of artifacts from the National Museum of Iraq by Islamic State militants, can be used as an easy way to express contempt for the concept of rules of war altogether. In the case of

336-467: A sudden change in a country or region's government, it can be difficult to determine what constitutes looting as opposed to a new government taking custody of the property in question. This can be especially difficult if the new government is only partially recognized at the time the property is moved, as was the case during the 2021 Taliban offensive , during which a number of artifacts and a large amount of property of former government officials who had fled

384-570: Is also sometimes included, as are the Malibu languages , though without any factual basis. Adolfo Constenla Umaña argues that Cueva , the extinct dominant language of Pre-Columbian Panama long assumed to be Chibchan based on a misinterpreted Kuna vocabulary, was actually Chocoan , but there is little evidence. The Cofán language (Kofán, Kofane, A'i) of Ecuador and Colombia has been erroneously included in Chibchan due to borrowed vocabulary. On

432-612: Is derived from the name of an extinct language called Chibcha or Muisca , once spoken by the people who lived on the Altiplano Cundiboyacense of which the city of Bogotá was the southern capital at the time of the Spanish Conquista . However, genetic and linguistic data now indicate that the original heart of Chibchan languages and Chibchan-speaking peoples might not have been in Colombia, but in

480-498: Is either the result of direct orders, despite to Russia's claims to the contrary, or due to Russian soldiers not being issued with adequate food and other resources by their commanders. The term "looting" is also sometimes used to refer to antiquities being removed from countries by unauthorized people, either domestic people breaking the law seeking monetary gain or foreign nations, which are usually more interested in prestige or previously, "scientific discovery". An example might be

528-612: Is located near the coast. According to Reichel-Dolmatoff 's research, it contains at least 254 terraces and had a population of about 3,000 people. Archaeological studies in the area show that even larger nucleated villages existed towards the western slope of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta , like Posiguieca and Ciudad Antigua. Smaller villages and hamlets were part of a very robust exchange network of specialized communities, connected with stone-paved paths. Villages that specialized in salt production and fishing, like Chengue in

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576-633: Is most renowned for its distinctive goldwork. The earliest known Tairona gold work has been described for the Neguanje Period (from about 300 to 800 AD). Its use in the Tairona society appears to have extended beyond the elite, although little proof of this exists. The gold artifacts consist of pendants, lip-plugs, nose ornaments, necklaces, and earrings. The Tairona cast a meltable mixture of gold, silver and copper called Tumbaga into intricate moulds using clay, sand, charcoal and lost wax. Depletion gilding, using controlled corrosion to remove copper from

624-472: Is prohibited by international law , and constitutes a war crime . During a disaster, police and military forces are sometimes unable to prevent looting when they are overwhelmed by humanitarian or combat concerns, or they cannot be summoned because of damaged communications infrastructure. Especially during natural disasters, many civilians may find themselves forced to take what does not belong to them in order to survive. How to respond to that and where

672-403: Is the act of stealing, or the taking of goods by force, typically in the midst of a military, political, or other social crisis, such as war , natural disasters (where law and civil enforcement are temporarily ineffective), or rioting . The proceeds of all these activities can be described as booty , loot , plunder , spoils , or pillage. During modern-day armed conflicts , looting

720-667: The Andaki , Barbakoa , Choko , Duho , Paez , Sape , and Taruma language families due to contact. The extinct languages of Antioquia , Old Catío and Nutabe have been shown to be Chibchan (Adelaar & Muysken, 2004:49). The language of the Tairona is unattested, apart from a single word, but may well be one of the Arwako languages still spoken in the Santa Marta range. The Zenú a.k.a. Sinú language of northern Colombia

768-636: The Gulf War , Saddam Hussein 's soldiers caused significant damage to both Kuwaiti and Saudi infrastructure. They also stole from private companies and homes. In April 2003, looters broke into the National Museum of Iraq, and thousands of artefacts remain missing. Syrian conservation sites and museums were looted during the Syrian Civil War , with items being sold on the international black market . Reports from 2012 suggested that

816-604: The Indian and Pakistani militarized zones is common and widespread. In 2022, international observers accused Russia of engaging in large scale looting during the Russo-Ukrainian War , reporting the widespread looting of everything from food to industrial equipment. Despite the publication of numerous photos and videos by Ukrainian journalists and civilians, numerous Russian commanders have denied these claims. International observers have theorized that this looting

864-529: The Jaguar ." Although Tairona may be an inaccurate name for the people who inhabited the region during the contact with the Spanish Empire, it has become the most common name for a hierarchical network of villages that developed around 900. Initially it was used to refer to the inhabitants of a valley and probably a chiefdom named Tairo on the northern slope of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta . But by

912-481: The Parque Tairona , are evidence of a robust Tairona political economy based on specialized staple production. Chengue contains at least 100 terraces and was inhabited by about 800 to 1,000 people in 15 hectares by 1400. The Tairona are known to have built stone terraced platforms, house foundations , stairs , sewers , tombs , and bridges . Use of pottery for utilitarian and ornamental or ceremonial purposes

960-774: The early modern period and reaching its peak in the New Imperialism era, European colonial powers frequently looted areas they captured during military campaigns against non-European states. In the 1930s, and even more so during the Second World War , Nazi Germany engaged in large-scale and organized looting of art and property , particularly in Nazi-occupied Poland . Looting, combined with poor military discipline , has occasionally been an army's downfall since troops who have dispersed to ransack an area may become vulnerable to counter-attack,

1008-465: The 16th century, the Spanish used it for the whole group of complex chiefdoms in the area. The groups in the northern and western Sierra Nevada were largely indistinguishable to the Spaniards, and became indistinguishable to archaeologists in more modern times. The archaeological sequence of the region spans from approximately 200 BC to the 17th century , when the Tairona were forcibly integrated into

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1056-539: The Colombian Caribbean coast by sedentary or semi-sedentary populations has been documented to have occurred by c. 4000 BC. Ethnohistorical data shows that initial contact with the Spanish was tolerated by the Tairona; but by 1600 AD confrontations grew, and a small part of the Tairona population moved to the higher stretches of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. This movement allowed them to evade

1104-569: The Spanish Encomienda system. The available Carbon-14 dates show that the coastal sites were occupied from perhaps as early as 200 BC, much earlier than those at higher elevations , including some of the largest centers, at 1,200 metres (3,937 ft) above sea level. The coves and inlets on the Caribbean coast, like Chengue , Neguanje , Gayraca , Cinto and Buritaca , where villages have only more modest architecture, show

1152-400: The Tairona revolted against the Spanish, apparently because economic and religious pressure from the Spanish had become intolerable. The main aggression was the killing of priests and travellers along the roads connecting the Spanish city of Santa Marta and the Tairona centers of Bonda and the villages of Concha and Chengue. Secondary targets were the churches and houses of known bureaucrats of

1200-460: The Tairona valleys as densely populated, with extensive fields irrigated in the same way as those in Tuscany . Many villages were dedicated to fishing and traded their marine goods for the rest of their needs with those living inland. Anghiera describes how they aggressively repelled the Spanish when they attempted to take women and children as slaves in the first contacts. It appears that as

1248-545: The antiquities were being traded for weapons by the various combatants. Both customary international law and international treaties prohibit pillage in armed conflict . The Lieber Code , the Brussels Declaration (1874), and the Oxford Manual have recognized the prohibition against pillage. The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 ( modified in 1954 ) obliges military forces not only to avoid

1296-649: The area of the Costa Rica - Panama border, where the greatest variety of Chibchan languages has been identified. A larger family called Macro-Chibchan , which would contain the Misumalpan languages , Xinca , and Lenca , was found convincing by Kaufman (1990). Based primarily on evidence from grammatical morphemes, Pache (2018, 2023) suggests a distant relationship with the Macro-Jê languages . Jolkesky (2016) notes that there are lexical similarities with

1344-741: The basis of shared grammatical innovations, Pache (2023) argues that Pech is most closely related to the Arhuacic languages of northern Colombia, forming a Pech-Arhuacic subgroup. Internal classification by Jolkesky (2016): ( † = extinct) Below is a full list of Chibchan language varieties listed by Loukotka (1968), including names of unattested varieties. Pache (2018) is the most recent reconstruction of Proto-Chibchan. Other reconstructions include Holt (1986). Proto-Chibchan reconstructions by Constenla (1981): Proto-Chibchan horticultural vocabulary (Constenla 2012): Proto-Chibchan reconstructions by Pache (2018): Looting Looting

1392-513: The celebration of victory. In the wake of the Napoleonic Wars and particularly after World War II , norms against wartime plunder became widely accepted. In the upper ranks, the proud exhibition of the loot plundered formed an integral part of the typical Roman triumph , and Genghis Khan was not unusual in proclaiming that the greatest happiness was "to vanquish your enemies... to rob them of their wealth". In ancient times, looting

1440-463: The colonial administration. However, these data are from Spanish testimonies from the trial against the Tairona chiefs in 1602. The Chiefs of Chengue and Bonda were sentenced to death, their bodies dismembered, their villages burned, and much of the population was relocated and incorporated into the Encomienda system. By the mid-17th century, many Tairona populations were completely abandoned and

1488-513: The country fell into the hands of the Taliban before they were recognized as the legitimate government of Afghanistan by other countries. Further looting and burning of civilian homes and villages has been defended by the Taliban as within their right as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. Looting can also be common in cases where civil unrest is contained largely within the borders of

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1536-474: The defeated populations, which were often enslaved . Women and children might become absorbed into the victorious country's population, as concubines , eunuchs and slaves. In other pre-modern societies, objects made of precious metals were the preferred target of war looting, largely because of their ease of portability. In many cases, looting offered an opportunity to obtain treasures and works of art that otherwise would not have been obtainable. Beginning in

1584-561: The descriptions of Tairona homosexuality were an attempt by the Catholic establishment to abolish the Tairona male meeting house, which was the site of intense and permanent religious activity. These rituals are believed to be very similar to those of the Kogui , modern descendants of some of the Tairona chiefdoms. Many of the adult men are involved in rituals, sometimes lasting days, and consisting mostly of coca chewing and meditation. In 1599,

1632-730: The destruction of enemy property but also to provide for its protection. Article 8 of the Statute of the International Criminal Court provides that in international warfare, "pillaging a town or place, even when taken by assault", is a war crime . In the aftermath of World War II , a number of war criminals were prosecuted for pillage. The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (1993–2017) brought several prosecutions for pillage. The Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 explicitly prohibits

1680-476: The line between unnecessary "looting" and necessary " scavenging " lies are often dilemmas for governments. In other cases, looting may be tolerated or even encouraged by governments for political or other reasons, including religious, social or economic ones. Looting by a victorious army during war has been a common practice throughout recorded history. Foot soldiers viewed plunder as a way to supplement an often-meagre income and transferred wealth became part of

1728-446: The longest occupations, spanning the whole 1,800 years. Knowledge sources about the pre-Columbian Tairona civilization are limited to archaeological findings and a few written references from the Spanish colonial era. One of the first descriptions of the region was written by Pedro Martyr d' Anghiera and was published in 1530. The area also was described by other explorers who visited the region between 1505 and 1524. Anghiera portrays

1776-564: The looting of civilian property during wartime. Theoretically, to prevent such looting, unclaimed property is moved to the custody of the Custodian of Enemy Property , to be handled until returned to its owners. Despite international prohibitions against the practice of looting, the ease with which it can be done means that it remains relatively common, particularly during outbreaks of civil unrest during which rules of war may not yet apply. The 2011 Egyptian Revolution , for example, caused

1824-403: The power of the wearer and the bellicose nature of Tairona society at that time. Not only that, but recent revelations have shown that this was the first step of a process known as 'transformation', which involved members of the shaman elite putting on sub-labial ornaments, nose rings etc. to resemble certain bat species and extract powers from the animal, opening their eyes to a greater truth. At

1872-551: The region was engulfed by forest. Their descendants today are the Kogi , Arhuaco , Wiwa , and Kankuamo people. Chibchan The Chibchan languages (also known as Chibchano ) make up a language family indigenous to the Isthmo-Colombian Area , which extends from eastern Honduras to northern Colombia and includes populations of these countries as well as Nicaragua , Costa Rica , and Panama . The name

1920-654: The removal of the contents of Egyptian tombs that were transported to museums across the West . As part of World War II reparations , Soviet forces systematically plundered the Soviet occupation zone of Germany, including the Recovered Territories , which later transferred to Poland. The Soviets sent valuable industrial equipment, infrastructure and whole factories to the Soviet Union. Many factories in

1968-503: The surface, gave the appearance of solid gold. Cast Tairona figure pendants (known as "caciques") in particular stand out among the goldworks of pre-Columbian America because of their richness in detail. The figurines depict human subjects - probably the shamanic elite that ruled them - in ornate dresses and with a large animal mask over the face. Many elements of their body posture (e.g., hands on their hips) and dress signal an aggressive stance, and hence are interpreted by some as evidence for

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2016-424: The time of the conquest, the Tairona had different traditional cultural practices than modern Native American populations. Ethnographic sources highlight freedom to divorce and acceptance of homosexuality, which differed significantly from their Catholic conquerors. The Tairona religion, and to some extent modern Kogui religion, separate much of the domestic life between genders. Modern scholars have determined that

2064-731: The worst of the Spanish colonial system during the 17th and 18th centuries. The indigenous Kogi , Wiwa , Arhuacos (Ijka, Ifca) and Kankuamo people who live in the area today are believed to be direct descendants of the Tairona. Etymological similarities of the word Tairona survive in the four main linguistic groups of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta: in Sanca Language it is pronounced Teiruna , in Kankuamo language Teijua or Tairuna , and in Ijka , Teruna , meaning "Males" or "sons of

2112-677: Was also highly developed as a result of fairly specialized communities. The Tairona ceramic chronologies range from 200 BCE to 1650 CE, and the Caribbean coast of Colombia has evidence of ceramics from at least 2500 BCE. Recent investigations in Chengue, Parque Tairona by the Colombian archaeologist Alejandro Dever show significant variations in the ceramic that allow for a chronological division of sequence into at least five phases. The first phase, called Nahuange 1, appears to start at around 200 BCE and ends at around 500 CE when there appears to be

2160-591: Was among the factors sapping the loyalty of Poles to Russia . Local civilians can also take advantage of a breakdown of order to loot public and private property, as took place at the Iraq Museum in the course of the Iraq War in 2003. Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy 's novel War and Peace describes widespread looting by Moscow 's citizens before Napoleon 's troops entered the city in 1812, along with looting by French troops elsewhere. In 1990 and 1991, during

2208-507: Was discovered by looters in 1975 but is now under the care of the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History. Recent studies suggest that it was inhabited by approximately 1,600 to 2,400 people that lived in at least 11,700 square meters (124,000 square feet) of roofed space, in about 184 round houses built on top of terraces paved with stone. There are many other sites of similar or greater size. A larger site, Pueblito,

2256-442: Was shown by numerous works done in the 1980s by Colombian archaeologists Augusto Oyuela, Carl Langebaek, Luisa Fernanda Herrera and Ana Maria Groot, and others. During the Tairona period, the evidence for exchange increases as does the population of the entire region. The causes for this population increase are not fully known but what is evident is the robust local exchange networks that emerge at this time. The Tairona civilization

2304-566: Was sometimes prohibited due to religious concerns. For example, King Clovis I of the Franks, forbade his soldiers to loot when they campaigned near St Martin 's shrine in Tours, for fear of offending the saint. Moses, Joshua and Samuel at various points ordered the Israelites not to take loot from their enemies due to God's commandment. In warfare in ancient times, the spoils of war included

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