Colla People

The Qulla (Quechuan for south, Hispanicized and mixed spellings: Colla, Kolla) are an Indigenous people of western Bolivia, northern Chile, and the western portions of Jujuy and Salta provinces in Argentina. The 2004 Complementary Indigenous Survey reported 53,019 Qulla households living in Argentina. They moved freely between the borders of Argentina and Bolivia. While mostly living in arid highlands, their easternmost lands are part of the yungas, an altitude forests at the edge of the Amazon rainforest.

==History== Qulla traditions and historians like Thérèse Bouysse-Cassagne and Teresa Gisbert, in addition to linguist Alfredo Torero, posits a link to the pre-Incan Tiwanaku Polity. The Qulla have lived in their region for centuries. Sillustani is a prehistoric Qulla cemetery in Peru, with elaborate stone chullpas. Several groups made up the Qulla people, including the Zenta, and Gispira. The Qulla came into contact with Spaniards in 1540. They resisted the Spanish invasion for many years but ultimately failed and the Santiago Estate fell into Spanish hands. One particularly famous rebel leader was Ñusta Willaq, a female warrior who fought the Spanish in 1780. With Argentinian independence in 1810, the situation of the Qulla people did not improve and they worked for minimal wages.