Five hundred years ago, on March 31 1520, the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan began a sojourn in a part of South America that has been known as Patagonia ever since.
Throughout the Philippine Islands, Magellan and his men regularly interacted with the natives. At Cebú, The native chief, his wife, and several of the natives were baptized and converted to Christianity. Because of this, Magellan thought he could convince other native tribes to convert.
The last full-blooded Selk'nam, Ãngela Loij, died in 1974. They were one of the last aboriginal groups in South America to be reached by Europeans. With the assimilation of many groups who later became Argentinians and Chileans, Selk'nam territory was conquered.
The Tehuelche were eventually defeated and culturally assimilated by the European settlers. They believed in spirits of the bush and in a supreme being who had created the world but did not intervene in its working. Their shamans cured sickness with assistance from spirits.
In the southernmost part of South America, Patagonia occupies 260,000 square miles spanning Argentina and Chile. The region is known for dramatic mountain peaks, an abundance of glaciers and an array of unique wildlife.
Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan was the first European to reach Patagonia, stopping there briefly in 1520 during his voyage around the world.
Over 600,000 Argentines, or 1.49% of the population, self-identify as indigenous. The most populous of these indigenous groups are looked at below.
Argentina - History & Culture. Along with numerous nomadic tribespeople, two main indigenous groups existed in Argentina before the European arrival. In the northwest, near Bolivia and the Andes, was a people known as the Diaguita, while further south and to the east were the Guarani.
The history of Argentina dates back thousands of years, with the first human settlements beginning on the southern tip of Patagonia 13,000 years ago. The indigenous people here and in the Pampas were advanced hunters and gatherers and included the Yamana and the Tehuelches.
The most common ethnic groups are a mix between Spanish (including Galicians and Basques), Italian and Native American. It is estimated that up to 30 million Argentines, up to 62.5% of the total population, have Italian ancestry, wholly or in part. There are also some Germanic, Slavic, Irish and French populations.
The original Brazilians were the native Indians who had inhabited the American continent long before Europeans arrived. At the time Europeans came there were 250 tribes of the Tupi-Guarani Indians in Brazil.
The name is derived from the Latin argentum (silver). The first use of the name Argentina can be traced to the voyages of the Spanish conquerors to the RÃo de la Plata. The explorers who shipwrecked in Juan DÃaz de SolÃs' expedition found native communities in the region who gave them silver presents.
21 Amazing Facts About Argentina
- Argentina produced the world's first animated feature film in 1917.
- Yerba Mate is the most popular drink in Argentina.
- Argentina is home to both the highest and lowest points of the Southern Hemisphere.
- The capital of Argentina Buenos Aires translates to the 'good airs' or 'fair winds'
1516: Spanish explorer, Juan Diaz de Solis became first European to reach Argentina discovering Rio de Plata. 1536: Spaniards founded a short-lived settlement on the bay.
Colonial Argentina is designated as the period of the History of Argentina when it was an overseas territory of the Spanish Empire. It begins in the Precolumbian age of the indigenous peoples of Argentina, with the arrival of the first Spanish conqueror.
While Argentina's official language is Spanish, Argentina has enjoyed so much international migration that Arabic, Italian, German, English, and French are also spoken—at least in pockets throughout the country. There are also over one million speakers of various tribal languages, including Quecha and GuaranÃ.
The word 'indigenous' refers to the notion of a place-based human ethnic culture that has not migrated from its homeland, and is not a settler or colonial population. To be indigenous is therefore by definition different from being of a world culture, such as the Western or Euro-American culture.
Fifteen different indigenous languages are spoken throughout Argentina, but most of them only have a couple thousand speakers or fewer. Some of them are endangered, spoken by only a handful of older people whose children don't speak the language.
They speak Quecha and Aymara, the main speaking groups together with Spanish.
Mapuche, the most numerous group of Indians in South America. They numbered more than 1,400,000 at the turn of the 21st century. Most inhabit the Central Valley of Chile, south of the BiobÃo River. A smaller group lives in Neuquén provincia, west-central Argentina.
Today the collective group makes up over 80% of the indigenous peoples in Chile, and about 9% of the total Chilean population. The Mapuche are particularly concentrated in the AraucanÃa region.
Mapuche.
| Total population |
|---|
| c. 1,950,000 |
| Regions with significant populations |
| Chile | 1,745,147 (2017) |
| Argentina | 205,009 (2010) |
The Mapuche society had great transformations after Spanish contact in the mid–16th century. These changes included the adoption of Old World crops and animals and the onset of a rich Spanish–Mapuche trade in La Frontera and Valdivia.
The Mapuche people are the largest ethnic group in Chile and constitute approximately 10% (more than 1.000. 000 people) of the Chilean population. Half of them live in the south of Chile from the river BÃo BÃo until the Chiloé Island. The other half is found in and around the capital, Santiago.
The Mapuche are a group of indigenous inhabitants of Southern Chile and Argentina, including Patagonia. When the Spanish arrived in the 18th century, they lived in fertile valleys as hunter gatherers, maintaining a culture which is said to have prevailed since 500 BC.
Spanish forces: Conquerors companies (1546–1557)
Arauco War.
| Date | Historiographic divergence: 1546 – until the end of the 17th century; and sporadically the 18th century 1550 – 1662 (112 years) 1550 – 1656 (106 years) |
|---|
| Result | Peace parliaments between the Spanish Crown and the Mapuche groups. |
Mapuche are the largest indigenous groups in Chile, comprising about 84 per cent of the total indigenous population or about 1.3 million people.
What does the Mapuche flag symbolize? The Mapuche flag's colors, stripes and symbols represent aspects of an indigenous cosmovision and indigenous liberation. The yellow drumlike center includes symbols like the sun, moon and stars, all of which represent knowledge.
