Viceroyalty of New Granada

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - Cite This Source

The Viceroyalty of New Granada (Spanish: Virreinato de la Nueva Granada) was the name given in 1717 to a Spanish colonial jurisdiction in northern South America, corresponding mainly to modern Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela. Before the nineteenth century independence struggles, the Viceroyalty of New Granada existed as a political and administrative entity which also extended to include oversight over local authorities in Ecuador, Guyana, Panamá, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela, as well as small parts of Brazil and Peru.

Colonial history

After the establishment of an Audiencia (a "court of hearing") at Santa Fé de Bogotá and of the New Kingdom of Granada in the sixteenth century, whose governor was loosely dependent upon the Viceroy of Peru at Lima, the slowness of communications between the two capitals led to the creation of an independent Viceroyalty of New Granada in 1717 (and its reestablishment in 1739 after a short interruption); other provinces corresponding to modern Ecuador and Venezuela, and eventually Panama, until then under other jurisdictions, came together in a political unit under the jurisdiction of Bogota, confirming that city as one of the principal administrative centers of the Spanish possessions in the New World, along with Lima and Mexico City. Sporadic attempts at reform were directed at increased efficiency and centralized authority, but control from Spain was never very effective.

The rough and diverse geography of northern South America and the limited range of proper roads made travel and communications inside the Viceroyalty difficult. The establishment of a Captaincy General in Caracas and an Audiencia in Quito, still legally subordinated to the Viceroy, was a response to the necessities of effectively governing their surrounding regions, and some analysts consider that it was also reflecting a degree of local traditions that, much later, eventually contributed to creating differing political and national differences between the newly independent territories that the unifying efforts of Simón Bolívar could not overcome.

Demographics

New Granada was estimated at having 4,345,000 inhabitants in 1819:

Source: World Population, GDP and Per Capita GDP, 1-2003 AD

Main Cities

By population

1 - Caracas
2 - Cartagena de Indias
3 - Quito
4 - Santa Fe
5 - Panama
6 - Cuenca
7 - Popayan
8 - Tunja
9 - Santa Marta
10 - Guayaquil

Independent history

The territories of the Viceroyalty gained full de facto independence from Spain between 1819 and 1822 after a series of military and political struggles, uniting as part of a federation known as Gran Colombia.

When Ecuador and Venezuela became separate states during the dissolution of Gran Colombia, a "Republic of New Granada" centered around the capital of Bogotá lasted from 1831 to 1856, and "New Granada" was a usage that later survived in conservative circles, such as among ecclesiastics.

Today, some people in Venezuela sometimes still refer to Colombians as neogranadinos ("new-granadians").

Notes