Chunsua

Hunza was the seat of the zaque, the northern ruler of the Muisca, on a cold plateau of the Eastern Cordillera. Tradition says the Muisca chose Hunzahúa of Ramiriquí as supreme lord, and the title zaque ("great lord") passed down in Hunza, matched by the zipa at Bacatá. Around 1490 the zipa Saguanmachica marched on the zaque Michua with 50,000 men and the two lords died in the same battle at Chocontá. The last zaque, Quemuenchatocha, held court in a fenced compound with gold and emeralds.

On 20 August 1537 Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada rode in with horses and dogs and seized his gold, emeralds and cloth. Quesada's brother Hernán Pérez de Quesada took Quemuenchatocha's successor Quiminza prisoner on a rumour of revolt, and had him beheaded in 1540, ending the line of the Hunza rulers. On 6 August 1539 Gonzalo Suárez Rendón had founded Tunja on the zaque's own enclosure, where the Augustinian convent later rose. Franciscans arrived in 1550, Dominicans a year later and Jesuits by 1611. Tunja became a "mother city" of the colony's Andean east, rich in churches and poets. In 1781 the Comuneros revolt over taxes reached it, and in 1811 Tunja proclaimed itself a republic.