The elder brothers, the Kogi people, who retreated through dense Colombian jungle to high mountain sanctuaries from lost cities, rather than be conquered by Europeans or converted by missionaries, have sent their first emissary ever to Europe to warn us that we are are killing the earth.
Kogi priest (in white hat) with Kogi workers tending to the lost city of the Tairona.
photo: Steven Ferry, National Geographic
The Kogi, living descendants of the Tairona civilization, live in the most dramatic coastal topography on earth. Their traditional lands range from Caribbean coral reefs to snow covered peaks nearly 19,000 feet high.
Located in northern Colombia and covering close to one million acres, Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta National Park rises nearly 19,000 feet from the Caribbean Sea. It is set apart from the Andes chain that runs through Colombia and is the highest coastal mountain, only 26 miles from Caribbean beaches. The Sierra Nevada is source to 35 watersheds, making it a regional "water factory" supplying 1.5 million residents as well as nearby farming plains. 85% of the Sierra is overlapped with the indigenous communities of the Kogi-Arsario and the Arhuaco.
The Sierra Nevada’s characteristics make it one of the most unique landforms on the planet. From rainforest to snow capped mountains, Sierra contains examples of all biomes represented in Colombia, making it a fine representation of the flora and fauna of all tropical America.
Tairona gold art is displayed in the world's greatest museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of art in New York City.
Since they were driven from their cities hundreds of years ago, the Kogi have focused on spiritual development centered on environmental stewardship.
Descendants of an ancient South American civilization called the Tayrona and numbering perhaps 45,000 today, the Kogi, Arhuaco, and Wiwa peoples fled death and pestilence four centuries ago, seeking refuge in a mountain paradise, whose peaks soar more than 18,000 feet above the Caribbean coast of Colombia. In the wake of the conquest they developed an utterly new dream of the Earth, a revelation that balanced the baroque potential of the human mind and spirit with all the forces of nature.
For hundreds of years the Kogi lived a Platonic existence in the mountains, separated from the wars and violence below by impenetrable jungle.
The four existing indigenous tribes of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta are the remnants of a sophisticated pre-Hispanic civilization known as the Tayrona. When the first Spaniards set foot in Colombia in the 16th century, they found a civilization that practiced sustainable farming through crop rotation and vertical ecology, built terraced drainage systems that minimized erosion, and produced exceptional gold and pottery work. But the conquistadores drove the tribes high up into the mountain, where they tried to protect their culture through isolation. The Kogi were able to maintain the most traditional culture while the Wiwa and Arhuaco experienced different levels of acculturation. The Kankuamo, who had all but disappeared, are now working to recover their language and culture. Estimates for the total number of native people living in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta range between 35,000 and 51,000.
Though the tribes speak different languages, they have nevertheless retained a common spiritual tradition. According to this tradition, when the great Mother created the world, she spun a spindle, and the threads that unspooled crossed to form the four Tayrona peoples and the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta itself. Within the indigenous communities, every action and behavior is informed by what they call the "Law of Origin," an ecological philosophy that governs their relationship to nature, animals, weather, bodies of water and the cycles of the planets and stars. The spiritual practices and ethical beliefs of the Tayrona revolve around their conception of aluna, which is the belief that all reality is created by thought, and that every object or being has both a physical reality and a spiritual essence, all originating in thought. The tribes’ highly trained ritual priests—the mamas—communicate in the aluna dimension through ritual and meditation. In their communion with the aluna world, the mamas focus on maintaining the ecological and spiritual equilibrium of the mountain.
The lost city of the Tairona was discovered by an aggressive grave robber in 1973. The Kogi watched their ancient city looted and despoiled for a decade. Then they began to observe the glaciers and snows retreat from the high mountains, threatening their agriculture and water supplies.
The Kogi priests were compelled to act. They reached out to British anthropologists to warn us that our actions were devastating the earth.
This astounding, prescient movie, made in 1990 by Alan Ereira, the first person brought into the Kogi's mountain world, was the first warning by the Kogi.
Click alternative second link to movie here. The embed HTML failed.
This amazing movie is worth watching for the full 53 minutes. For those that don't have time to watch the whole movie, here is the 6 minute conclusion that focuses on the effects of climate and environmental change.
Six minute movie conclusion here (embed failed).
Since the movie was made the Kogi have maintained their culture while becoming involved with Colombian politics. They have successfully regained control of large areas of ancestral land that had fallen to grave robbers and drug gangs. They have helped the Colombian government regain stability in the Santa Marta region.
Now, for the first time the Kogi have sent an emissary to Europe.
Jacinto, who is a spokesperson for the Mamos, the Kogi spiritual leaders who have a unique wisdom forged by an entire childhood spent living in the dark, arrived in London the previous night. He is staying with Alan Ereira, who made a BBC documentary, The Heart of the World, about their life 20 years ago. What are Jacinto's first impressions of our society?
"The first thing that is noticeable to me is that this is still the world," he says. "What's visible is construction, what you have made. This is not something we, the Kogi, are used to seeing. You give precedence to the use of a thing rather than its source. That's the intellectual error. Ultimately, it's all nature."
The Kogi are working on a second warning, only this time on their terms. This time Alan Ereira is assisting them in producing a movie that they script and film so that we can see the world from their perspective.
One thing they have adopted is filmmaking – the Kogi believe a movie is their best hope not only of telling little brother where he is going wrong, but showing him. This time, however, the Kogi's film is not being masterminded by Ereira: "They decided after the first film that this was the best way to connect with the world," he explains. "But they realised that to be in our hands was just not a good idea." So Ereira is assisting, and seeking funding for the project, which will be completed next summer. Judging by the Kogi's trailer, the authentic voice of an indigenous people makes for compelling viewing but the BBC have not expressed an interest, so instead, Ereira and the Kogi are planning a movie release. Footage of the Kogi conducting rituals beneath a spectacular tree is straight out of Avatar. "Avatar has done great work for this," Ereira says. "Twenty years ago, the Kogi were pushing on a wheel that had just started to turn. Now that wheel is really rolling and they are part of the zeitgeist."
The Kogi may not feel under attack culturally, but in their mountain environment "a lot has changed" in the last two decades, according to Jacinto. "The Sierra is the heart of the world. It functions the same way as our own heart does – it sustains the organism," he says. "There has been snow melt, landslides and earthquakes. People are damaging the sacred places from where the damage can be restored."
We must listen to the Kogi. Western science supports them.
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