Charrúa

The territory of present-day Uruguay contains no significant vestiges of civilizations existing prior to the arrival of European settlers, in contrast to most Latin American countries.

Lithic remains dating back ten thousand years have been found in the north of the country.

They belonged to the Catalan and Cuareim cultures, whose members were presumably hunters and gatherers.

Other peoples arrived in the region four thousand years ago.

They belonged to two groups, the Charrua and the Tupi-Guarani, classified according to the linguistic family to which they belong.

Neither group has evolved past the middle or upper Paleolithic level, which is characterized by an economy based on hunting, fishing, and gathering.

Other, lesser indigenous groups in Uruguay include the Yaro, Chaná, and Bohán.

Presumably, the Chaná reached lower Neolithic levels with agriculture and ceramics.

Spanish seamen in the early sixteenth century search for the strait linking the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans.

Juan Diaz de Solis enters the Rio de la Plata by mistake in 1516 and thus discovers the region.

Charrua natives allegedly attack the ship as soon as it arrives and kill everyone in the party except for one boy (who is rescued a dozen years later by Sebastian Cabot, an Englishman in the service of Spain).

Although historians currently believe that Diaz de Solis was actually killed by the Guarani, the "Charrua legend" has survived, and Uruguay has found in it a mythical past of bravery and rebellion in the face of oppression.

The fierce Charrua will plague the Spanish settlers for the next three hundred years.

In 1520 the Portuguese captain Ferdinand Magellan casts anchor in a bay of the Rio de la Plata at the site that will become Montevideo.

Other expeditions reconnoiter the territory and its rivers.

Hernando Arias de Saavedra, the first Spanish governor of the Rio de la Plata region, discovers the rich pastures and introduces the first cattle and horses into the region of present Uruguay in 1603.

Early colonizers are disappointed to find no gold or silver, but well-irrigated pastures in the area contribute to the quick reproduction of cattle—a different kind of wealth.

English and Portuguese inhabitants of the region, however, initiate an indiscriminate slaughter of cattle to obtain leather.

During the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, the Charrua learn the art of horsemanship from the Spaniards in adjacent areas, strengthening their ability to resist subjugation.

The natives are eventually subdued by the large influx of Argentines and Brazilians pursuing the herds of cattle and horses.

Never exceeding ten thousand in number in eighteenth-century Uruguay, the natives also lack any economic significance to the Europeans because they usually do not produce for trade.

As a result of genocide, imported disease, and even intermarriage, the number of natives rapidly diminishes, and by 1850 the pureblooded native will have virtually ceased to exist in Uruguay.

The Portuguese, seeking to expand Brazil's frontier in 1680, had founded Colonia del Sacramento on the Rio de la Plata, across from Buenos Aires.

Forty years later, the Spanish monarch orders the construction of Fuerte de San Jose, a military fort at present-day Montevideo, to resist this expansion.

With the founding of San Felipe de Montevideo at this site in 1726, Montevideo becomes the port and station of the Spanish fleet in the South Atlantic.

The new settlement includes families from Buenos Aires and the Canary Islands to whom the Spanish crown distributes plots and farms and subsequently large haciendas in the interior.

Authorities are appointed, and a cabildo (town council) is formed.

Montevideo is on a bay with a natural harbor suitable for large oceangoing vessels, and this geographic advantage over Buenos Aires is at the base of the future rivalry between the two cities.

The establishment of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata in 1776, with Buenos Aires as its capital, aggravates this rivalry.

Montevideo is authorized to trade directly with Spain instead of through Buenos Aires.

Montevideo's role as a commercial center is bolstered when salted beef begins to be used to feed ship crews and later slaves in Cuba.

The city's commercial activity is expanded by the introduction of the slave trade to the southern part of the continent because  Montevideo is a major port of entry for enslaved Africans.

Thousands of enslaved Africans are brought into Uruguay between the mid-eighteenth and the early nineteenth century, but the number is relatively low because the major economic activity—livestock raising—is not labor intensive and because labor requirements are met by increasing immigration from Europe.

New settlements are established in the region of present Uruguay throughout the eighteenth century to consolidate the occupation of the territory, which constitutes a natural buffer region separating Spanish from Portuguese possessions.

The Spanish, to combat smuggling, protect ranchers, and contain the natives, form a rural patrol force called the Blandengues Corps.

Spanish prestige is weakened in 1808 when Napoleon invades Spain and installs his brother Joseph on the throne.

The cabildo of Montevideo, however, creates an autonomous junta that remains nominally loyal to Ferdinand VII as the king of Spain.

Montevideo's military commander, Javier de Elío, eventually persuades the Spanish central junta to accept his control at Montevideo as independent of Buenos Aires.

In 1810 criollos (those born in America of Spanish parents) from Buenos Aires take the reins of government in that city and unseat the Spanish viceroy.

The population of the Banda Oriental is politically divided.

The countryside favors recognizing Elîo's junta in Buenos Aires; the authorities in Montevideo want to retain a nominal allegiance to the Spanish king.

Britain, at war with Spain, invades the Rio de la Plata Estuary in late 1806 to avenge Spain's recapture of Buenos Aires from the British.

The ten thousand-member British force captures Montevideo in early 1807 and occupies it until July, when it leaves and moves against Buenos Aires, where it is soundly defeated.

The interior of the Banda Oriental, led by Jose Gervasio Artigas, captain of the Blandengues Corps, rises in opposition to Elío when the latter prepares to take the offensive against Buenos Aires in February 1811, and Artigas offers his services to Buenos Aires.

Artigas, now forty-six years old, is the scion of a family that had settled in Montevideo in 1726.

Influenced by federalism, Artigas had been dissatisfied with the administration of the former colonial government in Buenos Aires, particularly with its discrimination against Montevideo in commercial affairs.

Artigas's army wins its most important victory against the Spaniards in the Battle of Las Piedras on May 18, 1811.

He then besieges Montevideo from May to October 1811.

Elío saves Montevideo only by inviting in the Portuguese forces from Brazil, which pour into Uruguay and dominate most of the country by July 1811.

This October Elio concludes a peace treaty with Buenos Aires that provides for the lifting of the siege of Montevideo and the withdrawal of all the troops of Artigas, Portugal, and Spain from Uruguay.

Artigas, his three thousand troops, and thirteen thousand civilians evacuate Salto, on the Rio Uruguay, and cross the river to the Argentine town of Ayuf, where they camp for several months.

This trek is considered the first step in the formation of the Uruguayan nation.

The Portuguese and Spanish troops do not withdraw until 1812.

At the beginning of 1813, after Artigas has returned to the Banda Oriental, having emerged as a champion of federalism against the unitary centralism of Buenos Aires, the new government in Buenos Aires convenes a constituent assembly.

The Banda Oriental's delegates to elect assembly representatives gather and, under instructions issued by Artigas, propose a series of political directives.

Later known as the "Instructions of the Year Thirteen," these directives include  the declaration of the colonies' independence and the formation of a confederation of the provinces (the United Provinces of the Rio de la Plata) from the former Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata (dissolved in 1810 when independence was declared).

This formula, inspired by the Constitution of the United States, would have guaranteed political and economic autonomy for each area, particularly that of the Banda Oriental with respect to Buenos Aires.

However, the assembly refuses to seat the delegates from the Banda Oriental, and Buenos Aires pursues a system based on unitary centralism.

Consequently, Artigas breaks with Buenos Aires and again besieges Montevideo.

Artigas lifts his siege of Montevideo at the beginning of 1814, but warfare continues among the Uruguayans, Spaniards, and Argentines.

In June 1814, Montevideo surrenders to the troops of Buenos Aires.

Artigas controls the countryside, however, and his army retakes the city in early 1815.

Once the troops from Buenos Aires have withdrawn, the Banda Oriental appoints its first autonomous government.

Artigas establishes the administrative center in the northwest of the country, where in 1815 he organizes the Federal League under his protection.

It consists of six provinces—including four present-day Argentine provinces—demarcated by the Rio Parana, Rio Uruguay, and Rio de la Plata—with Montevideo as the overseas port.

The basis for political union is customs unification and free internal trade.

To regulate external trade, the protectionist Customs Regulations Act (1815) is adopted. 

This same year, Artigas also attempts to implement agrarian reform in the Banda Oriental by distributing land confiscated from his enemies to supporters of the revolution, including Indians and mestizos (people of mixed Indian and European ancestry).