Cumana
e una
citta
del
Venezuela
di 423.546 abitanti,
capitale
dello Stato di
Sucre
, che si affaccia sul
golfo di Cariaco
.
Fu sede della prima
missione
stabilita in America, tuttavia, questa falli dando inizio alla conquista armata che ne fece la prima citta europea in terra sudamericana ad essere fondata, chiamata "La Primogenita" nel 1520
[1]
. La citta fu fondata da
Giacomo Castiglione
nel 1523 con il nome originario de "la gloriosa Santa Ines de Nueva Cordoba"
[2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
. Fin dal
XVI secolo
, si impose come un fiorente centro di scambi commerciali disponendo inoltre di numerose fabbriche di
cotone
.
Dal punto di vista geologico e geografico il Venezuela e situato al confine di due placche tettoniche, quella
caraibica
e quella
sudamericana
, in aggiunta, e attraversato da tre grandi sistemi di faglie geologiche: la
faglia di Bocono
, quella di El Pilar e quella di San Sebastian
[8]
. Il primo importante terremoto segnalato dopo l'insediamento delle coste caraibiche fu quello che nel 1530 distrusse la fortezza di Cumana, all'epoca nota come Nueva Toledo, e colpi inoltre la citta di
Nuova Cadice
sull'isola di
Cubagua
[8]
[9]
. Altri eventi catastrofici incomberono su Cumana nel corso degli anni successivi, fra questi, il terremoto del 1629 che causo la morte di circa trecento persone radendo al suolo la chiesa e altri edifici religiosi e quello del 1794
[8]
.
Presenta sul territorio diverse case coloniali.
Sorgono nella citta il castello cinquecentesco di San Antonio de la Eminencia e il castello de Santa
Maria de la Cabeza
del
XVII secolo
.
A partire dagli
anni sessanta
ha avuto un discreto sviluppo il turismo grazie ai suoi edifici religiosi, fra questi la chiesa di santa Ines, il convento di san Francisco.
Tra i musei ospitati dalla citta si ricordano il Museo de arte contemporaneo, il Museo de arqueologia e historia e il Museo Gran Mariscal de Ayacucho.
La citta e sede arcivescovile.
La citta e servita da un aeroporto collocato a circa 10 km dal centro cittadino.
- ^
(
EN
) Tomas Straka, Guillermo Guzman Mirabal e Alejandro E. Caceres,
Discovery and conquest period
, in
Historical dictionary of Venezuela
, 3ª ed., Lanham, Rowman & Littlefield, 2018, pp. 5-8,
ISBN
9781538109496
,
LCCN
2017033067
.
≪[...] Soon after Christopher Columbus reached the continental mass of America for the first time in 1498, the first rush to riches took place with the "pearl fever" in Cubagua, the first political territorial unity was created (Gobernacion of Coquibacoa, 1502), the first European city in South America was founded (Cumana, named as
La Primogenita
, "The Firstbom," in 1520), and the first mission in America was established (in 1513, also in Cumana), all in Venezuelan territory. [...] For his part, Ojeda obtained from the Spanish Crown the first Spanish
gobernacion
in South America, in current Guajira Peninsula, named Gobernacion of Coquibacoa (1502). Nevertheless, the pearl deposits at the island of Cubagua, in eastern Venezuela, were the ones that led to the first European permanent settlement, Nueva Cadiz, founded around 1500. The Crown gave Nueva Cadiz the rank of city in 1528 [...] When the missions failed, the armed conquest started, leading to the foundation of the city of Cumana. [...]≫
- ^
(
EN
) Leonard Victor Dalton,
Venezuela
(
PDF
), New York ? Londra, Charles Scribner's Sons ? T. Fisher Unwin, 1912, p. 70.
URL consultato l'11 novembre 2022
.
≪A second semi-military expedition from Hispaniola in 1521, under the leadership of Jacome Castellon, built the castle of Araya in spite of the Cubaguans, and founded the city of
la gloriosa Santa Ines de Nueva Cordoba
, the modern Cumana. The fortress was reduced to ruins by an earthquake in 1530. In the meantime, orders had been received from Spain to name the already existing city on Cubagua, Nueva Cadiz, and three years later, in 1524, La Asuncion was founded on the island of Margarita, while in 1527 the inhabitants of New Cadiz received the right to elect annually an alcalde, the Emperor giving 500 pesos for rebuilding the church there. Thus we have three cities founded in Venezuela territory within the ?rst twenty-?ve years of the sixteenth century.≫
- ^
(
EN
) James D. Henderson, Helen Delpar e Maurice Philip Brungardt,
A reference guide to Latin American history
, a cura di Richard N. Weldon, Armonk, New York ? Londra, M. E. Sharpe, 2000, p. 59,
ISBN
1-56324-744-5
,
OCLC
875918219
.
≪1520 Native Americans and Spanish clashed on the Venezuelan coast. Reacting against Spanish slaving expeditions and forced labor in the pearl fisheries of Cubagua, the native Americans rebelled against the Spanish. The punitive expedition of Jacome Castellon followed in retaliation, and he began building a fort at the future site of Cumana. May 19. The Dominican priest Bartolome de las Casas, defender of the rights of native Americans, was licensed to colonize Venezuela. Obligated to establish three towns with forty residents each, las Casas failed in this and in his attempt to convert the natives. His order's mission of Chichirivichi was destroyed by the natives in October.≫
- ^
(
EN
) Thomas E. Weil
et al.
,
Area handbook for Venezuela
, a cura di
The American University
, Washington, Superintendent of Documents ? U.S. Government printing office, 1971, p. 33,
LCCN
74-611208
,
OCLC
211419
.
≪As Spanish mines and plantations in the Antilles used up the local Indian populations, raids on the relatively docile Indians of the coast became more frequent. To control such traffic and to protect the Indians, Spain sent Jacome Castellon, who, after subduing the Indians of the northeast area, in 1523 founded a fortified city called Nueva Cordoba, known today as Cumana.≫
- ^
(
EN
)
Farming and fishing support Northeastern region
, in
Venezuela Up-to-date
, vol. 3, n. 7, Washington, Ambasciata del Venezuela, giugno 1952, p. 20,
ISSN
0042-3432
(
WC
·
ACNP
)
,
OCLC
1768984
,
SBN
IT\ICCU\UFI\0537970
.
≪Attempts at colonization from Hispaniola and later from Margarita began in 1513; but the humanitarian and scientific effort to further agriculture and Christianity among the Cumanagotos promoted by Friar Bartolome de las Casas was ruined by the interposition of soldier adventurers, against whom the local
caciques
revolted, and was finally dissipated in the punitive expedition of Ocampo. Jacome Castellon, who took over from Ocampo, then founded in 1523 the city of Nueva Cordoha which thrives today under the authoctonous name of Cumana.≫
- ^
(
ES
)
Bartolome de Las Casas
,
Capitulo 165
, in Andre Saint-Lu (a cura di),
Historia de las Indias
, vol. 3, Caracas, Biblioteca Ayacucho, 1986, pp. 608-609,
ISBN
980276020X
.
≪[...] los indios de la provincia de Cumana, despues de salido el clerigo Bartolome de Las Casas para la isla Espanola, mataron un fraile y ciertos criados suyos y quemaron el atarazana y toda la hacienda que alli tenia [...] Luego el Almirante y Audiencia y toda la Consulta, que dijimos ser con estos los oficiales del rey, determinaron de enviar otra armada para que castigase por guerra a aquella gente [...] Fue por capitan desta ente un vecino de la ciudad de Santo Domingo, llamado Jacome de Castellon. Este fue y llevo alguna gente, y tomo de la gente que estaba en la isla de Cubagua en la dicha pesqueria de las perlas, y junta cuanta pudo, paso a la Tierra Firme [...] y asentose con ella a la boca del dicho rio de Cumana [...] Desde alli envio cuadrillas de espanoles tras los indios, mato muchos dellos e hizo muchos esclavos [...] y asi quedaron apaciguados. Edifico Jacome Castellon una fortaleza a la boca del rio de Cumana, donde el clerigo de Las Casas la queria edificar [...] Hizose despues un muy buen pueblo de espanoles en la isleta, con muchas casas de piedras y adobes y tapias [...] pero acabadas las perlas, despues algunos y no muchos anos, se quedo la poblacion o pueblo todo despoblado [...] con las guerras dichas y esclaverias [...] y con las perlas esta desierta o casi desierta de sus habitadores toda aquella tierra.≫
- ^
(
ES
) Aristides Rojas,
Origenes venezolanos. Historia, tradiciones, cronicas y leyendas
(
PDF
), a cura di Gregory Zambrano, Caracas, Fundacion Biblioteca Ayacucho, 2008, p. 314,
ISBN
978-980-276-452-5
,
OCLC
664125814
.
URL consultato il 23 novembre 2022
. Ospitato su biblioteca.org.ar.
≪La segunda colonia de Venezuela despues de Cubagua, puede considerarse que fue la ciudad de Nueva Cordoba, hoy Santa Ines de Cumana, comenzada en 1521; y la Asuncion, capital de la Margarita, en 1525. Como se vera, a la Nueva Toledo de Ocampo debia seguir la Nueva Cordoba de Castellon, origenes de la moderna Cumana; mientras que la Asuncion debia continuar bajo el gobierno pacifico de Villalobos.≫
- ^
a
b
c
(
EN
) Tomas Straka, Guillermo Guzman Mirabal e Alejandro E. Caceres,
Natural disasters
, in
Historical dictionary of Venezuela
, 3ª ed., Lanham, Rowman & Littlefield, 2018, pp. 250-251,
ISBN
9781538109496
,
LCCN
2017033067
.
≪From a geographical and geological perspective, Venezuela is located at the edge of two tectonic plates, the Caribbean and the South American. [...] In addition, there are three large systems of geological faults that run across the north: the Bocono Fault (west), the San Sebastian Fault System (center), and El Pilar Fault System (east). [...] The first recorded American disaster occurred during the early years of the conquest of Venezuelan lands. On 1 September 1530, the fort built by Jacome Castellon, located in Nueva Toledo (now Cumana) was destroyed by an earthquake, which given its intensity also resulted in an episode of marine transgression. [...] During the 17th century, Cumana suffered a disaster with a high death toll in 1629 when the church and other religious buildings were leveled by an earthquake that caused the deaths of 300 people. [...] Other disasters of relevance in the 18th century took place in the cities of Maracaibo (1766), Trujillo (1775), and Cumana (1794). [...]≫
- ^
(
EN
) Leonard Victor Dalton,
Venezuela
(
PDF
), New York ? Londra, Charles Scribner's Sons ? T. Fisher Unwin, 1912, pp. 43-44 e pp. 73-74.
URL consultato l'11 novembre 2022
.
≪The first important tremor noticed after the discovery and settlement of the shores of the Caribbean was that of 1530, which shook the city of Nueva Cadiz on the Island of Cubagua and destroyed the fortress of Cumana, thus checking for some time the colonisation of the mainland in this region. Thirteen years later New Cadiz was visited again by earthquake and hurricane, and so disastrous were the results that from that day to the present Cubagua has been, what it was before the arrival of the Spaniards, a desert island. [...] In 1530 an earthquake shook the town and destroyed many buildings, not without loss of life, and in 1543 earthquake and hurricane together wrought so much havoc to life and property that only a few lingered on, persisting in the slave trade, for which New Cadiz was notorious, until at last the population decreased to nil in 1550; even the exact site of the city is now unknown.≫
