18 October 2011
General José Gervasio Artigas
was a respected soldier and statesman who became Uruguay’s national
hero. He was born in Montevideo in 1764. The land east of the Uruguay
River, that is now Uruguay, was then known as the Banda Oriental. The
people who lived in this La Plata province were known as Orientals.
Artigas joined the revolution against Spain in 1811 and rose to become
the military leader of the Orientals.Artigas saw the American Revolution as a model for self-rule and kept a copy of the United States Constitution with him at all times. He had a vision for the provinces of the Rio de la Plata to be governed on the same principles of independence as the United States of America. However, advocating for independent provinces put him at odds with the region’s centralized government based in Buenos Aires.
In 1814 Artigas formed the League of the Free Peoples, and was named their protector. In 1815 he liberated Montevideo from the Buenos Aires centralist government. In 1816 he again fought against Spanish troops who had returned to the region.
From 1816 though 1819, Artigas fought against Spain, Buenos Aires, and Brazil as the defender of the Orientals. Then in 1820 Brazil conquered the Banda Oriental and sent Artigas to Paraguay as an exile.
However, the struggle for an independent province was continued by thirty-three men (the Thirty-Three Orientals), who started a grass roots crusade that led to independence in 1825. In 1827 Great Britain advocated for an independent state to serve as a buffer between Argentina and Brazil. In 1828 the State of Uruguay was formed and in 1830 Uruguay’s first president was elected.
Artigas stayed in Paraguay until his death in1850, and is reported to have asked for a horse so he could die on horseback, as he had lived.
The statue of General Artigas on horseback is the centerpiece of Montevideo’s Plaza Independencia. His ashes were brought from Paraguay and placed in a large underground mausoleum in the plaza just behind the statue.
The name Uruguay is the abbreviated name for the Republica Oriental del Uruguay (Oriental Republic of Uruguay). The name “Uruguay” means “river of painted birds” in the language of the Guarani, a native people of the region. The motto of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay is Libertad o Muerte (Liberty or Death).