Ariguani

The Ariguaní flows through the lowlands south of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, in country associated with the people known in colonial records as Chimila. Their descendants include the Ette Ennaka of the Ariguaní plains. The river and its tributaries cross a landscape of forest and seasonal wetlands before joining the Magdalena drainage, which carries water northwards through the Caribbean lowlands to the sea.

Spanish expansion met repeated Indigenous resistance in the province of Santa Marta. Conflict continued into the eighteenth century, when colonial campaigns sought to subdue the Chimila and reorganise their settlements. Communities withdrew into the forests of the upper Ariguaní, maintaining a presence in the region despite the pressures of warfare and the pressures of colonial settlement.