Written by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck Santa Ana de Velasco, founded in 1755, holds the distinction of being the only Chiquitos mission founded by one individual, the Jesuit missionary Julián Nogler. It is also is the only settlement that has its original church almost wholly intact (restoration on it is ongoing), which also happens to be the only church built ...
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San José de Chiquitos mission, Chiquitania, Bolivia
Written by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck San José de Chiquitos, the third-oldest Jesuit mission in the Chiquitania and one of the prettiest, was founded in 1697 by Felipe Suárez (who later co-founded San Miguel de Velasco to the north) and Dionisio Avila. Relocated in 1706, it was its new location that made it the most important town in the region ...
Read More »San Ignacio de Velasco mission, Chiquitania, Bolivia
Written by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck San Ignacio de Velasco was founded in 1748, primarily for the benefit of the local Ugaraño peoples, by Jesuits Miguel Areijer and Diego Contreras. It was settled in part by the inhabitants of a former reducción, San Ignacio de Zamucos, which was destroyed three years earlier. One of the few missions that was not ...
Read More »Concepción mission, Chiquitania, Bolivia
Written by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck Concepción was first established as the mission of La Inmaculada Concepción in 1699, although this settlement lasted only until 1704. It was re-established in 1709 (a date that some historians incorrectly claim as its founding), and incorporated the nearby ephemeral mission of San Ignacio de Boococas in 1712. Concepción was established by Jesuit missionaries ...
Read More »San Javier mission, Chiquitania, Bolivia
Written by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck San Javier (originally San Francisco Xavier de los Piñocas), the earliest permanent Jesuit mission in the Chiquitania, was founded by the missionaries José de Arce and Antonio de Rivas on 31 December 1691. It was rebuilt three times (in 1696, 1698, and 1705-6) before assuming its present form in 1708. Today it is a ...
Read More »The Long Silence: The Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos after the Extrañamiento
Written by Geoffrey A P Groesbeck Introduction There is much still to discover regarding the early history of the Jesuit missions (reducciones1) of Chiquitos2 (1691-1767). By now it has been reasonably well documented3, albeit in greater detail in Spanish and German than in English. Over the last three decades, scholarly research on these missions’ individual and collective artistic, musical, and ...
Read More »A Brief History of the Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos
Written by Geoffrey A P Groesbeck Introduction It is a simple fact that no comprehensive history of the Jesuit missions of Chiquitos1 exists in English.2 There are numerous accounts in Spanish, most of which rely primarily upon two secondary sources dating from the nineteenth century: D’Orbigny’s recollections of his travels in the region between 1831 and 18333, and René-Moreno’s numerous ...
Read More »Book: Spice Islands Forts by Simon Pratt
Written by Marco Ramerini. On this page I want to write about an interesting book that has just been published. The book tells the story of the spice islands and focuses on the fortifications that Europeans built on these islands to control their trade. The story narrated in Simon Pratt’s book begins with the first contacts with Europeans and reaches ...
Read More »Letter by General Luis Jose Orbegoso y Moncada, 1834
Written by Randy Shaw. General Luis José de Orbegoso y Moncada, scion of an aristocratic criollo family from Trujillo, in northern Peru, was Provisional President of the country between 1833 and 1834, and was named in 1837-1838 President of the short-lived Republic of North Peru, set up by the Peru-Bolivia Confederacy after the invasion of the country by Bolivian strongman ...
Read More »Heraldic Coat of Arms encased in wood that belonged to Pedro Pizarro
Written by Randy Shaw Several years ago General Jose Ramon Pizarro who was many times over the great grandson of the Spanish Chronicler and Conquistador Pedro Pizarro passed away in Lima Peru his widow contacted a mutual friend to discuss an item that had descended down through the family of Pedro Pizarro. So on my next trip to Lima my ...
Read More »The Forts of the Spice Islands of Indonesia, Today
Written by Simon Pratt Forts of the Banda Islands The Banda Islands, reached via Ambon, contain some of the most historic and evocative forts of the old Dutch East Indies. Most impressive is Dutch-built Fort Belgica (constructed 1611) towering over the tiny township of Bandaneira. Following refurbishment in the 1990’s it remains the best preserved of all forts scattered across ...
Read More »Micronesia (1565-1994), Forgotten Island World in the Pacific
Written by Dietrich Köster German-Micronesia – also called “Island Territory” of German New Guinea – is the far-flung island world north of the equator in the Western Central Pacific and was up to 1914/1920 the northern part of German New Guinea, supplemented by the island of Nauru, lying just south of the equator. The land area is only slightly more ...
Read More »Spanish Colonial Remains 16th-18th century
Written by Marco Ramerini If you know something on colonial remains or if you have photos of such remains – they may be anywhere in the world -, send them to me. I’ll be happy to publish them on this website. Thank you. Marco. My e-mail is on the home page. SPANISH COLONIAL REMAINS AFRICA CANARY ISLANDS CEUTA, MELILLA EQUATORIAL ...
Read More »Bibliography of Spanish Colonial History: 16th-18th century
Written by Marco Ramerini. English text revision by Dietrich Köster. SPANISH EMPIRE GENERAL: – Lannoy, Charles de and van der Linden, Herman. “Histoire de l’expansion coloniale des peuples européens. Portugal et Espagne (jusuq’au début du XIXe siècle)” ? VI-[2]-451 pp. 4 maps Henry Lamertin, 1907, Bruxelles, Belgium. AFRICA: – Banciella, J. César, “Rutas del Imperio. Fernando Poo y Guinea” ? Victoriano ...
Read More »The Spanish Presence in the Moluccas: Ternate and Tidore
Written by Marco Ramerini. English text revision by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck The islands formerly known as the Moluccas – the Spice Islands – are five islands of volcanic origin (Ternate, Tidore, Moti, Makian, and Bacan). They are found off of the west coast of the island of Halmahera, in the Indonesian archipelago. These islands were the only ones in ...
Read More »The abortive expedition of Don Juan de Silva against the Dutch in the East Indies (1612-1616)
Written by Marco Ramerini. English text revision by Dietrich Köster. English translation of a small part of my work entitled “La presenza Spagnola alle Isole Molucche, 1606-1663”. In the propositions of the governor of the Philippines, Don Juan de Silva, a big joint expedition of Spaniards and Portuguese should succeed in getting rid of the Dutch forces present in Indonesian ...
Read More »Santa Ana de Velasco Mission: Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos (Eastern Bolivia)
Written by Marco Ramerini. Photos by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck Santa Ana de Velasco is a small village in the department of Santa Cruz in the Amazonian plains of Bolivia near the border with Brazil. The village lies at an altitude of 464 metres and at about 40 km south-east of San Ignacio de Velasco. The mission of Santa Ana de Velasco is one of the last ...
Read More »San Xavier Mission: Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos (Eastern Bolivia)
Written by Marco Ramerini. Photos by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck San Javier is a small town in the department of Beni in the Amazonian plains of the State of Bolivia. The city lies at an altitude of 537 metres between the Rio Paquius and the Río San Julián. The town of Concepcion is located 60 km north-east, while the city of Santa ...
Read More »San Rafael de Velasco Mission: Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos (Eastern Bolivia)
Written by Marco Ramerini. Photos by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck This mission is located in the town of San Rafael de Velasco which is located in Eastern Bolivia, about 40 km east of the city of San Miguel de Velasco and approximately 470 km north-east of the city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra. The city lies at an altitude of 408 meters in the ...
Read More »San Miguel de Velasco Mission: Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos (Eastern Bolivia)
Written by Marco Ramerini. Photos by Geoffrey A. P. Groesbeck This mission is located in the town of San Miguel de Velasco which is located in Eastern Bolivia, about 30 km south of the city of San Ignacio de Velasco. The city lies at an altitude of 485 meters in the region of Chiquitanía, an unspoilt area of Bolivia between the cities of Santa ...
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