Georg von Speyer

Georg von Speyer (* 1500 in Speyer, Rhineland; † 11 June 1540 in Coro, Venezuela) was a German conquistador in New Granada, now Venezuela and Colombia. His birth name was Georg Hohermuth but he chose to call himself after his place of birth. He is sometimes referred to as Jorge de la Espira, his name in Spanish.

Von Speyer was among the young fortune seekers solicited by the Augsburg banking families of Anton and Bartholomeus Welser to colonize New Granada in 1534. He was placed in charge of a new group of colonists who arrived in 1535, only to find himself the governor of the Welser concession, since the former governor Ambrosius Ehinger had died in 1533. Between 1535 and 1538 he searched in southwestern Venezuela and northern Colombia for El Dorado, in the company of Nikolaus Federmann and then with Philipp von Hutten. Because of ill health he resigned as governor in 1539.

His first expedition in search of El Dorado was at the urging of Nikolaus Federmann who had been in the area previously. Leaving from the town of Rio Hacha, they followed the eastern flank of the cordilla following the existing salt trade route where it crossed the Andes and entered the lands of the Chibcha. The Chibcha were an advance culture whose realm had already been partially conquered by Jiménez de Quesada out of Santa Marta, now Colombia, under orders from Pedro Fernández de Lugo. They returned to Coro empty handed.

References

* Chapman, Walker "The Golden Dream: Seekers of El Dorado." Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis 1967.
* Richter, Erich "Die Welser landen in Venezuela" W. Goldmann, Leipzig 1938.