Benkos Biohó was said to have been born in the region of Bioho, Guinea Bissau, West Africa

West Africa

West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. Geopolitically, the UN definition of Western Africa includes the following 16 countries and an area of approximately 5 million square km:-Flags of West Africa:...

 where he was seized by the Portuguese Pedro Gomez Reynel, the dealer, sold to businessman Juan Palacios and resold as a slave to the Spaniard Alonso del Campo in 1596, in Cartagena de Indias. He established the maroon

Maroon (people)

Maroons were runaway slaves in the West Indies, Central America, South America, and North America, who formed independent settlements together...

 community of San Basilio de Palenque

San Basilio de Palenque

San Basilio de Palenque or Palenque de San Basilio is a Palenque village and corregimiento in the Municipality of Mahates, Bolivar in northern Colombia. In 2005 the village was declared Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO...

 some time in the 16th century. He was betrayed and hanged

Hanging

Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck", though it formerly also referred to crucifixion and death by impalement in which the body would remain...

 by the governor of Cartagena in 1619.

The former African king escaped from the slave port of Cartagena with ten others and founded San Basilio de Palenque, the legendary "village of the Cimarróns". In 1713 it became "the first free village in the Americas" when the King of Spain gave up sending his troops on futile missions to attack their fortified mountain hideaway.

He is the great-great-great-great-grandfather of the late Afro-Colombian singer, composer and drummer, Paulino Salgado Valdez (Batata).

Also known as Domingo Bioho, he used a boat to travel down the Magdalena River

Magdalena River

The Magdalena River is the principal river of Colombia, flowing northward about through the western half of the country. It takes its name from the biblical figure Mary Magdalene. It is navigable through much of its lower reaches, in spite of the shifting sand bars at the mouth of its delta, as...

 to escape to freedom. He was recaptured, but escaped again in 1599 into the marshy land southeast of Cartagena. He organized an army that came to dominate all of the Montes de Maria

Montes de María

The Montes de María are a group of mountains of the northern coast of Colombia , which do not belong to the Andes ranges, and the highlands around them. The Montes de María are the last part of the Serranía de San Jerónimo.Montes de María is a zone located in the center of the Colombian...

. He also formed an intelligence network that collected and used information that would lead to the collapse of the city. He organized more escapes of runaway slaves to liberated territory, known as settlement. He was named king of handgun

Handgun

A handgun is a firearm designed to be held and operated by one hand. This characteristic differentiates handguns as a general class of firearms from long guns such as rifles and shotguns ....

s. Benko's name corresponds to a place east of the Senegal River

Sénégal River

The Sénégal River is a long river in West Africa that forms the border between Senegal and Mauritania.The Sénégal's headwaters are the Semefé and Bafing rivers which both originate in Guinea; they form a small part of the Guinean-Malian border before coming together at Bafoulabé in Mali...

.

Unable to defeat the Maroons, on July 18, 1605, the Governor of Cartagena, Gerónimo de Suazo y Casasola, offered a peace treaty to Benkos Bioho, recognizing the autonomy of the Palenque Matuna Bioho accepting that entered the city armed and dressed in Spanish, while the arena promised not receive more feral or stimulate new leak or to use title of king. Peace will only be finalized in 1612 under the governorship of Diego Fernandez de Velasco. The treaty was violated by the Spanish in 1619 when walking carelessly Bioho was caught by the guard of the wall and caught: he was hanged and quartered on 16 March 1621. Governor Garcia Giron who ordered the execution, arguing that it was dangerous bitterly respect Bioho generated in the population and that "lies and enchantment behind it takes all the nations of Guinea

Guinea

Guinea , officially the Republic of Guinea , is a country in West Africa. Formerly known as French Guinea , it is today sometimes called Guinea-Conakry to distinguish it from its neighbour Guinea-Bissau. Guinea is divided into eight administrative regions and subdivided into thirty-three prefectures...

 is in the city."

By the end of the seventeenth century in the area of Montes de Maria had over 600 Maroons, under the command of Domingo Padilla, who claimed for himself the title of captain while his wife Jane adopted that of viceroy

Viceroy

A viceroy is a royal official who runs a country, colony, or province in the name of and as representative of the monarch. The term derives from the Latin prefix vice-, meaning "in the place of" and the French word roi, meaning king. A viceroy's province or larger territory is called a viceroyalty...

, and successfully challenged attempts at sovereignty of the colonial authorities.

Historian Maria del Carmen Borrego Pla, using two subsets of the Archive of the Indies in Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

 published a study on runaway blacks in Cartagena in the late seventeenth century, bordered on three geographic areas as well: the north in the Sierra Luruaco composed of black Creoles

Creole peoples

The term Creole and its cognates in other languages — such as crioulo, criollo, créole, kriolu, criol, kreyol, kreol, kriulo, kriol, krio, etc. — have been applied to people in different countries and epochs, with rather different meanings...

 and known by the names of Betancur and Matubere; the center in the Montes de Maria, with people longstanding Maroon, arranged in four runaway, but only mentioned two of them, San Miguel and the Arenal, the south in the mountains of San Lucas, between the rivers Magdalena and Nechi

Nechi

Nechi is a town and municipality in the Colombian department of Antioquia....

, known as the palisades of Norosi

Norosí

Norosí is a town and municipality located in the Bolívar Department, northern Colombia. The municipality was established in 2007....

 and Cimarron, formed by black Creoles.

He later called Palenque de San Basilio was a symbol of independence for runaway slaves, became the first Free People of America, by Royal decree of the King of Spain in the year 1713. There he speaks its own language so far from the Old Portuguese, including words from African languages. Africans captured and spoke in different languages in the boat dealers, to communicate, learn the Portuguese language of their captors. When escape had not yet learned the Castilian and came to the fence to talk in Portuguese.

San Basilio de Palenque

San Basilio de Palenque

San Basilio de Palenque or Palenque de San Basilio is a Palenque village and corregimiento in the Municipality of Mahates, Bolivar in northern Colombia. In 2005 the village was declared Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO...

 was declared "Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity" by UNESCO in 2005. At about 50 miles east of Cartagena, on hills of strategic value were used as lookout posts, still hear the names of the runaway Neighborhood: Sincerin, Mahates

Mahates

Mahates is a river town and municipality located in the Bolívar Department, northern Colombia. The town of Mahates was founded on April 17, 1533 by Spanish conquistador Pedro de Heredia....

, Gambot.

External links

• Africans in Americas
• Central Africans and Cultural Transformations in the American Diaspora By Linda Marinda Heywood ISBN 0521002788
• Africa and the Americas: Interconnections During the Slave Trade By José C. Curto, Renée Soulodre-LaFrance Published 2005 Africa World Press Slave trade ISBN 1592212727
• Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience By Henry Louis Gates, Anthony Appiah ISBN 0465000711
• Facebook|Paulino Salgado Valdez (Batata)