Uruguay’s Bilingual Heritage and Portuñol

by Norman Berdichevsky (November 2011)

Like Belgium, Uruguay was established as a buffer state between two major nations (Brazil and Argentina), near the strategic mouth of the La Plata River, where the Rio Parana and the Rio Uruguay join. At the beginning of Uruguayan independence in 1828, the country had a scarce population of only 75,000. Only one major city, the capitol, Montevideo existed. The rest of the population was scattered in a northwestern, Portuguese speaking region and Spanish speaking South.

Cattle introduced by the Europeans soon ran wild over the Pampa and surrounding areas along the rivers where large herds provided a source of wealth in leather, hides, tinned beef and fresh and frozen meat with the advent of the railroad and refrigerated ships. This enormous resource was exploited by the gauchos, herders who owed little or no political allegiance to a central government or the ideal of a new nationality. They resisted the control of central governments and often fought among themselves. Only gradually, did all the gauchos find it necessary to restrict the movement of the great cattle herds to make easier and cheaper slaughter and packing possible.

As a result of the Napoleonic Wars, Britain became involved in the South American political puzzle and captured both Buenos Aires and Montevideo temporarily after Napoleon had imprisoned the Spanish King Ferdinand VII and invaded Spain in 1808. Local patriots in Argentina rejected the authority of the puppet Viceroy and established a caretaker government to rule over the colony in the name of the authentic King Ferdinand but secretly aspired to independence from Spanish rule. The Buenos Aires authorities could not however establish effective control over the east bank and outlying territories.

When the puppet Viceroy in Buenos Aires moved his court to Montevideo following the British occupation, his presence provoked independence sentiments among inhabitants on the east bank. They joined in a rebel movement believing that they would enjoy substantial autonomy in an independent Argentina. When their dissatisfaction with rule from the new capital of the independent Argentine Republic reached a critical point, Argentina insisted on loyalty to Buenos Aires and insisted on preventing the right of the East Bank to secede.

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