The San Agustín Archaeological Park (Spanish: Parque Arqueológico de San Agustín) is a large area with many ancient ruins near the town of San Agustín in the Huila Department of Colombia. It has the largest collection of religious monuments and large stone statues in Latin America and is considered the world's largest burial site. The park is part of the San Agustin culture and was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1995. The statues are thought to have been made between 5 and 400 AD, but the exact dates are not known. The people who carved the statues are still a mystery because the site has not been fully explored.
History
A Spanish monk named Fray Juan de Santa Gertrudis first described the statues. He visited the countries of Colombia (then part of the New Kingdom of Granada), Ecuador, and Peru in 1756–57 as a missionary. He passed through San Agustín in mid-1756. He wrote about the statues in his book with four parts, Maravillas de la naturaleza (English: Wonders of Nature).
Geography
The San Agustín Archaeological Park is located in the upper part of the Magdalena River and its main branches, in the town of San Agustín, Huila, in the eastern foothills of the Colombian Massif. This area is where three Andean mountain ranges run from south to north across the Andean Region. San Agustín is 520 kilometers from Bogotá. The remains of ancient cultural groups are found over an area larger than 50 square kilometers, on plateaus on both sides of the canyon formed by the high ground of the Magdalena River. The park includes a small area with many graves and more than 500 statues of unknown origin.
The San Agustín Archaeological Park includes the following sites:
• Lavapatas Source
• The Plank
• Alto de Lavapatas
• Chaquira
• Alto de las Piedras
• High Idols
In addition to the main park, there are two other sites: Alto de los Ídolos (Heights of the Idols) and Alto de las Piedras (Heights of the Stones), located in the municipality of Isnos, a few kilometers from San Agustín. Alto de los Ídolos is 4 kilometers from Isnos and contains the tallest statue in all the parks, which is 7 meters high. Alto de las Piedras is 7 kilometers from Isnos and includes the famous "Double I" ("Doble Yo") statue.
Statues
The statues show both human-like and animal-like features, such as crocodiles, bats, and jaguars. They have short legs. About 300 statues were discovered. They were painted with bright colors, including yellow, red, black, and white, but most are no longer colored today.
The statues differ in height, with the tallest reaching 23 feet (7.0 meters). Researchers believe they may be connected to funerals. In other areas of the archaeological site, where large burial mounds are found, there are more threatening figures, such as snakes, frogs, and birds, placed to guard the area and offer protection in the afterlife. Statues of gods and carvings on the ground include representations of solar gods (male) and lunar gods (female). These figures and statues help researchers understand how the civilization viewed life and death.
Repatriation
In 1913, German expert Konrad Theodor Preuss led an archaeological excavation in a region at the request of the Ethnological Museum of Berlin. He removed 21 small sculptures from the site and transported them to Berlin in 1919, where they were added to the museum's collection. In 2022, the Colombian government officially announced its plan to request the return of the statues from the Humboldt Forum, which is the current name for the Ethnological Museum of Berlin.
Gallery
List of Items:
– Statue in Mesita A
– Statues in Mesita B
– Statue in Mesita C
– Alto de las Piedras
– Alto de las Piedras