Tacuarembó ( Guarani: ''Takuarembo'', literally: " Bamboo shoot") is the capital city of the

Tacuarembó Department Tacuarembó () is the largest department of Uruguay and it is part of its northern region. Its capital is Tacuarembó. It borders Rivera Department to its north and east, the departments of Salto, Paysandú and Río Negro to its west and has th ...

in north-central

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

Location and geography

The city is located on Km. 390 of Route 5, south-southwest of

Rivera Rivera () is the capital of Rivera Department of Uruguay. The border with Brazil joins it with the Brazilian city of Santana do Livramento, which is only a street away from it, at the north end of Route 5. Together, they form an urban area of aro ...

, the capital city of the Rivera Department. Routes 26 and 31 also meet Route 5 within the city limits. The stream

Arroyo Tacuarembó Chico Arroyo often refers to: * Arroyo (creek), an intermittently dry creek Arroyo may also refer to: People * Arroyo (surname) Places United States ;California * Arroyo Burro Beach, a public beach park in Santa Barbara County, California * Arroyo ...

, a tributary of Río Tacuarembó, flows through the north part of the city. As of the census of 2011, it is the eighth most populated city of the country.

History

On 24 October 1831, a presidential decree by Fructuoso Rivera ordered the creation of a city in the region. The task was entrusted to the President's brother, Colonel

Bernabé Rivera Disambiguation Bernabé Rivera may refer to * Bernabé Rivera (footballer), Paraguayan soccer player * Bernabé Rivera, Uruguayan soldier (Spanish-language Wikipedia) Bernabé Rivera is a village in the Artigas Department of northern Uruguay ...

Colonel Rivera left

Montevideo Montevideo () is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2011 census, the city proper has a population of 1,319,108 (about one-third of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...

on a three-month journey with a caravan of wagons and families, towards the shore of the Tacuaremboty River, which in the

Guaraní language Guaraní (), specifically the primary variety known as Paraguayan Guarani ( "the people's language"), is a South American language that belongs to the Tupi–Guarani family of the Tupian languages. It is one of the official languages of P ...

means "river of the reeds". The area was surveyed and divided into blocks for settlement. On January 21, 1832, Coronel Rivera founded the town under the name "San Fructuoso", after Saint Fructuosus of Tarragona (whose

Saint's Day The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context d ...

is January 21) and after his (Benjamin's) brother. By 1837, San Fructuoso was a growing town. It had more than 500 residents, a justice of the peace, a military commander, a parish priest, a mayor, and a Public Works Commission. On 16 June 1837, the

was created (along with Salto and Paysandú), and San Fructuoso was named the capital. Over time, the community continued to grow. According to the Act of Ley Nº 2.389, on 17 July 1895 it held the status of "Villa" (town). Its name changed to "Tacuarembó", and on 24 June 1912, its status was elevated to "Ciudad" (city) by the Act of Ley Nº 4.031.

Population

In 2011, Tacuarembó had a population of 54,755. Source: ''Instituto Nacional de Estadística de Uruguay''

Places of worship

* St. Fructuosus Cathedral (

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

) * Holy Cross Parish Church (Roman Catholic) * St. Joseph Parish Church (Roman Catholic) * Our Lady of Lourdes Parish Church (Roman Catholic)

Climate

Tacuarembó has a

humid subtropical climate A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between latitudes 25° and 40° ...

, described by the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

as ''Cfa''. Summers are warm to hot and winters are cool, with frequent

frost Frost is a thin layer of ice on a solid surface, which forms from water vapor in an above-freezing atmosphere coming in contact with a solid surface whose temperature is below freezing, and resulting in a phase change from water vapor (a gas) ...

s and

fog Fog is a visible aerosol consisting of tiny water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the air at or near the Earth's surface. Reprint from Fog can be considered a type of low-lying cloud usually resembling stratus, and is heavily influ ...

. The precipitation is evenly distributed throughout the year, with an average of 1,165 mm (45.87 in), and the annual average temperature is 18 °C (64.4 °F).

Notable residents

Writers Circe Maia,

Mario Benedetti Mario Orlando Hardy Hamlet Brenno Benedetti Farrugia (; 14 September 1920 – 17 May 2009), was an Uruguayan journalist, novelist, and poet and an integral member of the Generación del 45. Despite publishing more than 80 books and being publish ...

Tomás de Mattos Tomás de Mattos Hernández (October 14, 1947 – March 21, 2016) was a Uruguayan writer and librarian. Being from Tacuarembó, de Mattos was one of the relatively few contemporary Uruguayan writers from the north of the country. As a librarian ...

, and

Jorge Majfud Jorge Majfud (born September 10, 1969) is a Uruguayan American writer. Life He was born in Tacuarembó, Uruguay. He received a professional degree in Architecture in 1996 from the University of the Republic in Montevideo and studied at Escu ...

are from Tacuarembó, as is José Núñez, 19th century Nicaraguan politician. Some Uruguayans claim that the tango musician

Carlos Gardel Carlos Gardel (born Charles Romuald Gardès; 11 December 1890 – 24 June 1935) was a French-born Argentine singer, songwriter, composer and actor, and the most prominent figure in the history of tango. He was one of the most influential inte ...

was born near Tacuarembó, in the village of Valle Edén. Scholarly consensus is that he was born in

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Par ...

, France, then raised in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

, but as an adult he obtained legal papers saying he was born in Tacuarembó, probably to avoid French military authorities.

References

External links

DelTacua.com.uy CommunityArticle on the Laguna de Lavaderas of the city's park, Official Portal of Uruguayan Government"Fundamentos Culturales de Tacuarembó" Washington Benavides, Ciudadano Ilustre de Tacuarembó.INE map of Tacuarembó and La Pedrera
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tacuarembo Populated places in the Tacuarembó Department Populated places established in 1832