Santiago del Estero
Santiago del Estero is a city in northern Argentina, the capital of the Santiago del Estero Province. It has a population of 244,733 inhabitants and a surface of 2,116 km. It lies on the Dulce River and on National Route 9, at a distance of 1,042 km north-northwest from Buenos Aires. Santiago del Estero is the oldest city founded by Spanish settlers in Argentina that still exists as such.
The city houses the Universidad Nacional de Santiago del Estero, founded in 1973, and Universidad Catolica, founded in 1960. Other points of interest include the city's Cathedral, the Santo Domingo Convent, and the Provincial Archeology Museum.
The Santiago del Estero Airport at coordinates is located 6 kilometres north of the city, and has regular flights to Buenos Aires and Tucuman.
The local climate is warm and dry, and it practically does not have a winter season.
Santiago del Estero and its region are home to about 100,000 speakers of the local variety of Quechua, making this the southernmost outpost of the language of the Incas. This is one of the few indigenous languages surviving in modern Argentina.
History
After a series of exploratory expeditions from Chile since 1543, Santiago del Estero del Nuevo Maestrazgo was founded on July 25 1553 by Francisco de Aguirre (although some historians consider that its real foundation was in 1550). It is the oldest city in Argentina, but except for several churches, it preserves little of its former colonial architecture.
The city was the capital of the Intendency of Tucuman during the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata, and first seat of its bishop; those were later moved to Salta and Cordoba respectively.
Santiago del Estero stands in the middle of an extensive but largely semi-arid agricultural region. Originally a forest area, their forests were exhausted by timber industries of British capital during the 19th century.
Culture
Some important figures related to the history of Santiago del Estero are Colonel Juan Francisco Borges, leader of the Independence War (ancestor of writer Jorge Luis Borges), the 19th-century painter Felipe Taboada, as well as the revolutionary leaders Mario Roberto Santucho|Mario Roberto and Francisco Rene Santucho, founders of the Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores and the Ejercito Revolucionario del Pueblo .
In the field of the arts, the town has provided important representatives, such as Ramon Gomez Cornet, Carlos Sanchez Gramajo, Alfredo Gogna, Ricardo and Rafael Tourino in plastic arts and Jorge Washington Abalos, Bernardo Canal Feijoo, Clementina Rosa Quenel, Alberto Tasso, Carlos Virgilio Zurita and Julio Carreras (h) in literature.
Santiago's musical heritage is one of the most important cultural aspects of the city, with typical folklore chacarera and zamba. Some renowned artists and groups include the Manseros Santiaguenos, Alfredo Abalos, Jacinto Piedra and Raly Barrionuevo.
See also
1817 Santiago del Estero earthquake
External links
Santiago del Estero Culture, art, myths: in Spanish.
Municipality of Santiago del Estero
Historia de Santiago del Estero
Universidad Nacional de Santiago del Estero
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Santiago del Estero
