| Total population | |
|---|---|
| MostColombians are of full or partial Spanish origin.[1] | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Throughout the country but mostly in theAndean Region,Caribbean Region,Orinoquia Region and major cities. | |
| Languages | |
| Colombian Spanish | |
| Religion | |
| Catholicism | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Spanish people,Basque Colombians,Mestizo Colombians,Colombian Jews |
| Part ofa series on the |
| Spanish people |
|---|
_alternate_colours.svg) Rojigualda (historical Spanish flag) |
| Regional groups |
Other groups |
| SignificantSpanish diaspora |
 Category •  Spain portal |
Spanish Colombians are Colombians of full or partialSpanish descent. Due toColombia's history as aSpanish colony, many Colombians are of full or partial Spanish descent.Colombian culture is heavily influenced bySpain's. Because of this, combined with the Colombian government using "White Colombian" instead of "Spanish Colombian", the term is rarely used.
Spanish explorers arrived in Colombia in 1499 to colonize the land. They built settlements in territories of theMusica Confederation, ignoring the views of the people who lived there. These establishments continued for three centuries with occupation, genocide, and war. While introducing a large African slave population, they displaced theIndigenous peoples. In 1499, the first Spanish explorer,Alonso de Ojeda, arrived on the coast of northern Colombia (Cabo de la Vela).
n 1501Rodrigo de Bastidas crossed the coast betweenCartagena andLa Guajira, discovering theMagdalena River. In 1510 Alonso de Ojeda foundedSan Sebastián de Urabá, the first Spanish settlement there, but that same year its provisional ruler, Francisco Pizarro, left. The settlement was moved to a site in theGulf of Urabá and launched under the direction ofMartín Fernández de Enciso asSanta María la Antigua del Darién. This city, the capital of the first Spanish government in the Castilla del Oro, was in abandoned in 1517. WithSanta Marta (1525) and Cartagena (1533), the Spanish established control of the Colombian coast.ConquistadorGonzalo Jimenez de Quesada entered the central region ofCundinamarca andBoyacá, conquering the powerfulChibcha culture, founding the city of Santa Fe de Bogota, Tunja ordered Gonzalo Suarez Rendon to name it theNew Kingdom of Granada region.
To establish a civil government in New Granada, he created a Real Audiencia in Santa Fe de Bogota in 1548-1549. The Royal Court combined executive and judicial authority until a presidency/governorship in 1564 assumed executive powers. Until 1550 the territory of Colombia was formed by the governors ofSanta Marta and Cartagena, which were subject to theAudiencia of Santo Domingo, and Popayan who was subject to theviceroyalty of Peru. The jurisdiction of the Real Audiencia de Santa Fe de Bogotá included these governorates since 1550 and extended in time over the surrounding provinces that were forming around the country corresponding to the New Granada.
In 1717,Santa Fe de Bogotá became capital of the Viceroyalty of New Granada, although that was suspended in 1724 due to financial problems. It was reinstated in 1740 and continued until the loss of Spanish power over the territories in the 1810s, which ledColombia become one ofSouth America's first independent nation and the third-oldest independent republic afterHaiti and theUnited States.
Thepaisas are an isolated population, and therefore evolved differently. They are mostly of Spanish descent, because Spanish men who settled in the region during the 16th and 17th centuries were accompanied by their wives. The mountains isolated the population until the late 19th century, when Antioquia entered the industrial revolution.[2]
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