Page 56 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Argentina

54  INTRODUCING ARGENTINA

16th-century engraving showing the nascent settlement of Buenos Aires on the banks of Río de la Plata

The Growth of Buenos Aires Reform and Discontent
In the late 16th century, Spain, The War of the Spanish Succession (1702–
threatened by Portuguese ambitions 1713) brought the Bourbon dynasty to the
in the region, renewed efforts to settle Spanish throne and also major changes in
eastern Argentina, and in 1580 an Crown policy. In 1768 Spain expelled the
expeditionary force re-established the Jesuits from its colo nies: their protection
port of Buenos Aires. However, in an from taxation represented lost reve nue.
empire that coveted gold and silver, In 1776, it created the new Viceroyalty of
the new port offered neither and for the Río de la Plata, declaring Buenos Aires
decades it languished as a colo nial capital of a terri tory encom passing
back water. Prosperity came in the 17th Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Upper
century with the smug gling of silver from Peru. The effect was stunning: Buenos
Upper Peru and then the appearance Aires’s population boomed with immi grant
of Argentina’s first estancias (ranches) – merchants as it transformed itself into a
the few cattle left behind by Mendoza’s dynamic commercial center. Interior cities
aborted expedition had multiplied expanded as the capi tal became an
into thousands on the fertile Pampas. important market for their produce,
Apart from con so lidating their shipping tobacco and yerba mate from
empire, Spain’s main aim was also to the northeast, wine from the Cuyo region,
spread Roman Catholicism. Jesuits led and cotton from the northwest.
the effort, founding several mis sions The commercial ascendancy of the new
from 1610 onwards. Exempt from tax- viceroyalty led to strict Crown enforce ment
ation, the missions devel oped lucrative of its mono poly over the trading system.
plantations of yerba mate, used for This eventually created ten sions between
infusions, and tobacco. criollos, American-born Spanish who were

1553–82 Expeditions 1595 Sale of African 1630–37 War between the Spanish
establish towns in the slaves begins in and Diaguita Indians
northwest and Cuyo Buenos Aires
area
1550 1590 1630 1670
1610 First Jesuit missions Ruins of the San
1580 Spanish rebuild established in the Ignacio Miní
settlement of Buenos Aires northeast mission
Jesuit seal

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