Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada

Who was Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada?

Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada was a Spanish explorer and conquistador in Colombia. He explored the northern part of South America. While successful in many of his exploits, acquiring massive amounts of gold and emeralds, he ended his career disastrously; and has been suggested as a possible model for Cervantes' Don Quixote. His father was a hidalgo relative of Gonzalo Francisco de Cordoba, and he has two known distant cousins: Hernán Cortes and Francisco Pizarro. Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada was born in Cordova, Spain, into a Jewish family which had converted to Catholicism before he was born.