The second room, The Zenú Tradition, describes the territory occupied by the Zenú community and its social description including metal crafts, economy, the importance of animals and regional biodiversity reflected in a very realistic representation of the fauna.

The importance of women is also enhanced and magnificently illustrated in multiple feminine representations as the fundamental axis for social reproduction.

The funeral rites, and the rituals and ceremonies related to funerals and the funeral grave mounds gain importance in the sense that they are related to fertility. The connection of women with the funeral rites is perceived in the rounded shape of the grave mounds and in the trousseaus found in excavations, composed of feminine representations with protruding bellies.

The Zenú community currently existing still builds these grave mounds and continues relating them to the maternal belly representing pregnancy.
Later populations living along the Magdalena River as the Malibú led off from the Zenú traditions.

As part of the tour, seven funeral parlours are exhibited in the hall connecting the two rooms on the second floor, representing the Tamalameque region in the Lower Magdalena Area as opposed to the Zenú grave mounds.

About 2,000 years ago, Colombia's Caribbean plains were inhabited by numerous Zenú groups who had similar ways of relating to their environment and shared the same concepts of life and death. They built an extensive system of waterways which was used for more than thirteen centuries to drain off floodwater. In the 16th century, they were still building burial mounds and making gold ornaments and pottery objects just as their ancestors had done, testimony to a long-lasting cultural tradition.

Around the time of the Spanish Conquest, the Zenúes, who were scattered over the non-floodable grasslands, had a similar way of thought to their neighbours in the River Magdalena valley and on the San Jacinto range.

Greater Zenú territory extended from the valley of the River Sinú to the lower River Cauca region. Farmers, fishermen, traders, goldsmiths and weavers were organised in towns that were governed by local lords who paid tribute to regional chieftains like Finzenú, who ruled over the River Sinú, Panzenú, leader of the floodable San Jorge river plains, and the mythical chieftain Zenufana, in the lower Cauca region, where gold deposits were found. Each of these had complementary political, religious and economic duties.

Regional leaders who enjoyed prestige and sacred power organised the community and ensured that it maintained the waterway system and held ceremonies at which the population's cultural identity was restated.Leaders in the Ayapel region were notable for the fact that they wore large, hammered, breast-shaped breastplates, decorated with zoomorphous figures.

Communities who had settled on the grasslands that separate the Sinú and San Jorge valleys, where Planeta Rica stands today, controlled barter activities. Their governors wore ornaments made of good-quality gold, adorned with hanging plates which glittered in the light.

For centuries, the goldsmiths of the San Jorge and lower Cauca river regions produced items like filigree earrings and ornaments hammered in fine gold en masse. This metalworking tradition lasted until after the Spanish Conquest.

Mining
Spanish historian López de Gomara described 16th century mining activities in the region in the following terms: ".....They pick up gold wherever they want...... in that river and in others, and sometimes they even fish out nuggets of pure gold, the size of eggs...." (1552).

Hammering and embossing
Zenú goldsmiths made numerous objects out of pure gold, by hammering. Refined metal was hammered over stone anvils until sheets of the desired length and thickness were obtained.
When the metal was hammered, it tended to fracture and harden; in order to regain its ductility, the goldsmiths heated the sheets until they were red hot, and then cooled them down so they could go on hammering them.

Embossed designs were achieved with chisels and awls, working on both sides while the object was resting on soft but resistant surfaces.

Transforming wax into metal
Casting using the lost wax technique was used for making thousands of filigree earrings and reproducing highly realistic three-dimensional shapes.

When hollow figures were being made, the design was first carved on a matrix made of clay and ground coal. This model was coated with beeswax and finished off with a funnel made of the same material, which was then used for pouring in the metal. In the case of solid objects, the figure was formed directly in the wax.

The coal and wax figure was then coated with successive layers of clay, which formed a mould. When this was dry, it was heated so that the molten wax could be removed, and liquid metal was poured into the empty space. When the mould was cold, it was broken, the casting channels were cut, and the object was polished.

Agriculture, fishing, hunting and the bartering of raw materials and manufactured products formed the basis of the economy. Villages in boundary zones between the different regions controlled movements of these goods.

In the 16th century, salt and shells came from villages on the coast, reeds and food products were harvested in the San Jorge valley, while gold came from the headwaters of the Sinú and San Jorge rivers and from the lower Cauca region. The Finzenú region, on the River Sinú, was noted for its metallurgy production, the weaving of blankets and hammocks, and the manufacture of basketwork objects.

The rebirth of the dead

Death was linked to life, to fertility, and to the glorification of one's ancestors. At funeral ceremonies, the rebirth of the deceased in the underworld was celebrated with dancing and music, while the burial mound was being built over his tomb. Different groups gathered on these occasions, and the prestige of the leaders was reinforced.

The deceased was buried together with his belongings. Funerary regalia varied according to the social position of the person concerned, and included highly-decorated goblets, vessels, musical instruments and personal ornaments.

On top of the burial a tree was planted. Together with the roundness of the tumulus and the clay women that accompanied the dead, the tree was meant to symbolise fertility and new life. Bells were hung from its branches and they tinkled in the wind.

Religious beliefs, temples and women

Periods of flooding and drought, abundant harvests and the reproduction of the society were women's matters, according to these people's religious thought. This explains why thousands of clay women were buried in funeral mounds, and it also explains the religious and political importance of women in the 16th century, when the great religious centre of Finzenú was run by a female chieftain.

Bare parts of the body were painted with mineral and vegetable pigments, using pottery stamps and rollers. The designs that were stamped on the chest were similar to the woven baskets and blankets.

The conquest of the plains

Governor Pedro de Heredia founded the city of Cartagena in 1533 and headed an expedition up the River Sinú in search of the gold of the "Mogote graves". The plundering of Zenú graves along the Sinú and in the San Jorge and Cauca valleys was so successful, and the region was so rich in indigenous labour and cultivated products, that these were to finance local government in Cartagena for many years.

The Zenú population declined after 1100 A.D. People grouped together along the River Sinú and on the grasslands bordering the marshy regions, and some areas were settled by people from the River Magdalena.

In the Magdalena valley and on the mountains in the San Jacinto range lived sailors, goldsmiths and farmers who took advantage of rises in river level to fertilise the land on which they planted corn and manioc. They had social dealings with the Zenúes, were related to them and even shared religious ideas, and their goldwork, pottery and fabrics had common themes running through them. In the 16th century, the Spaniards called these groups Malibúes.

The peoples of the San Jacinto range and those who lived on the banks of the River Magdalena remained in those areas until colonial times. The goldsmiths of this region preferred copper-rich alloys for their ornaments, which are notable for depicting scenes where feline figures, amphibians and birds predominate. They portrayed the attired human figure very schematically. The feathered headdresses, sticks and breast ornaments suggest the shaman, with his power attributes. Pendants with a human face and feathered headdress are prolonged in bodies which could be those of a fish, lizard or crustacean; a mythical, aquatic creature typical of those marshy and riverside environments.

In 1589, the historian Briones de Pedraza described a ceremony he witnessed in the lower Magdalena region:

"Some of them wore feathered hats on their heads... and in order... all of them on 'dúhos', which are the chairs they sit on... right at the front go the leaders... and these leaders always have two gourds full of chicha placed in their hands... and they are accompanied by their pipers, who play very long flutes".

The potters of the River Magdalena also made containers shaped like women, with rounded features. As with the Zenúes, these were deposited as part of a deceased person's funerary offerings.

In Lower Magdalena burial in funerary urns was carried out as a secondary process, sometime after death. The person was consigned definitively in these urns to the underworld, where he or she would be in contact with other deceased relatives. The designs of the painting on the faces of these urns, which come from the Tamalameque region, could represent the social status of individuals in the community, which was retained even after death.