Pijao 4.96

Pijao is a municipality in the south-eastern part of the department of Quindío, Colombia. The township is located 31 km south of the departmental capital Armenia.In 2005 Pijao had an estimated population of 10,250, of which 5,700 live in the urban center.GeographyPijao is bounded to the north by Buenavista and Córdoba, to the south by Génova, to the west by the Valle del Cauca Department, and to the east by the department of Tolima. It has an area of 243 km².HistoryThe first settlers in the Pijao region arrived in the 1890s from Tolima. Many were radical Liberal guerrillas, fleeing reprisals from the governing Conservative regime and the civil disorder that culminated in the Thousand Day War. Among them were Quintiliano Fernández and his wife Griselda Marín. Loaiza (2004) cites their great-grandson, who tells of how their Conservative enemies tracked the couple to Pijao, where they had built a house and farm. The pregnant Griselda was hung from a tree and tortured until she revealed the location of her father, a leading guerrilla from Tolima.Other settlers arrived from Manizales and Antioquia. The inhabitants of the area decided to construct a town in order to have a church, school and other amenities. Juan García donated the land to form the village, located in a small valley on the banks of the Lejos River. The founding act of the town was signed on May 15, 1902.