• Colonial Argentina

• Modern Argentina

• Part of Viceroyalty of Perú

• 750,000 Indians (compare 25 million in Central Mexico)

• 3,000 Spaniards

• 25 cities founded in 16th C in the region

• Split between country & city (Buenos Aires)

• Bs As is merchant centre (silver from Potosí)

• Countryside: basic agriculture, little transportation

• International rivalries

• British try to oust Spanish

• Establishment of Viceroyalty of River Plate

British defeat of Armada 1804-05 (Trafalgar)

British invasion of Bs As (1806) (failed)

Napoleon invades Portugal & Spain (1808)

Fall of Seville (1810), second week of May

Independence: 25th May 1810

• Post-independence struggles

• Loss of territories (Bolivia, Paraguay)

• Frictions between Bs As and hinterland exacerbated

• Emergence of Unitarians and Federalists

• Rise of cuadillismo

• Independance Wars / Civil War - till 1820

• Unitarians vs Federalists

• 1826: Rivadavia vs Caudillos (Juan Facundo Quiroga)

• Rise of General Juan Manuel de Rosas

• Rosas' regime

• Exile of Unitarian intellectuals: Sarmiento / Echeverría etc.

• Mazorca