''La Gazeta de Caracas'' ( es, The Caracas Gazette) was the first

newspaper A newspaper is a periodical publication containing written information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as politics, business, sports a ...

printed in

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

; its first issue was published on October 24, 1808. In 1814, its name changed to ''Gaceta de Caracas''. The newspaper was issued, with some interruptions, until January 1822. It was printed by the Britons Matthew Gallagher and James Lamb, who had brought a printing press from

Trinidad Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands of Trinidad and Tobago. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is often referred to as the southernmos ...

. They became the first typographers working in Venezuela. The newspaper published news and ideas favorable toward the current government, which would subject it to rapid changes in editorial policies as the

Venezuelan War of Independence The Venezuelan War of Independence ( es, Guerra de Independencia de Venezuela, links=no, 1810–1823) was one of the Spanish American wars of independence of the early nineteenth century, when independence movements in Latin America fought agai ...

raged; its sympathies alternated between royalist and republican, somewhat undermining its credibility.

Andrés Bello Andrés de Jesús María y José Bello López (; November 29, 1781 – October 15, 1865) was a Venezuelan- Chilean humanist, diplomat, poet, legislator, philosopher, educator and philologist, whose political and literary works constitute an ...

was almost permanently editor of the newspaper until it changed name in 1814. The significance of having newspapers in South America at the turn of the 19th century has been linked to the causation of nationalism worldwide. This idea is explored in Benedict Anderson's book Imagined Communities.Anderson 1991

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Defunct newspapers published in Venezuela Mass media in Caracas Newspapers published in Venezuela Publications established in 1808 Publications disestablished in 1822 Spanish-language newspapers {{venezuela-newspaper-stub