The Caldas coat of arms is the main emblem of this department of Colombia and one of the three official symbols along with the flag and the anthem. It is an old French style blazon.
Its elements symbolize the Caldense geography represented in the jungle mountains, the Nevado del Rui z volcano and the Cauca and Magdalena rivers, which cross its territory.
It also contains figures and heraldic symbols that denote the history of this Colombian department, located in the so-called paisa region or coffee axis.
History
As with the Caldas flag, the coat of arms is also of unknown origin, or at least there is no literature available on its author.
Some people attribute its authorship to the musician and historian Guillermo Ceballos Espinosa, creator of the hymn of the department of Caldas.
But this is not sufficiently supported, since no information is known in which the master Ceballos Espinosa himself has attributed his creation. However, what does seem to be clear is that the shield was created recently.
Description
The shield of the department of Caldas is of old French style, due to the shape it has in the lower part of the border. Its edges are rounded, ending in a vertex that points downwards.
The blazon contains in a yellow background a mountain with three peaks, two made of sinople (green) and the highest one made of silver (ash white).
This top is “surmounted (on it without touching it) with colored pomegranates, cracked with gules (red), carved and folded with sinople (green), all trained (towards the left) and sinister (towards the right) of each rivers of azure (blue color) ”.
Meaning
In heraldry, the gold field of the departmental shield represents both metal and the Sun; also air and fire, faith, justice, charity, nobility and solidity, as well as prosperity and defense of the homeland.
The mountain with three peaks represents the geography of the department: the jungle mountains and the Nevado del Ruiz volcano.
The rivers in blue that cross the field of gold and meet the mountain are the Cauca and the Magdalena.
Both rivers are the main waterways of transportation of the department and fundamental factors of the regional economic activity.
The cracked and stemmed pomegranate represents the birth of the Republic of New Granada, between 1831 and 1858, which occurred after the dissolution of Gran Colombia in 1830.
The figure of the pomegranate fruit is one of the representative symbols of Colombia. So much so that the current coat of arms of the republic preserves it.
References
- Caldas Department Shield. Consulted on November 16 from todacolombia.com
- Caldas (Antioquia, Colombia). Consulted from flagspot.net
- Shield of Caldas. Consulted of es.wikipedia.org
- Caldas Department. Consulted of sogeocol.edu.co
- Flags and coats of arms of the departments of Colombia. Consulted of es.wikipedia.org
- History of Caldas. Consulted from web.archive.org
- The symbols and their meaning. Consulted of simbolosysignificados.blogspot.com