José de Oviedo y Baños (1671 -

Caracas Caracas ( , ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern p ...

, 20 November 1738) was a Neogranadine military officer and historian.

Career

Oviedo entered the military in Caracas at age 18, and became a Knight of the

Order of Santiago The Order of Santiago (; ) is a religious and military order founded in the 12th century. It owes its name to the patron saint of Spain, ''Santiago'' ( St. James the Greater). Its initial objective was to protect the pilgrims on the Way of S ...

in 1690. He retired from the army in 1730, having reached the rank of

Lieutenant general Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a military rank used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the battlefield, who was norma ...

in 1728.

Work

His work ''Historia de la conquista y población de la Provincia de Venezuela'' (History of the conquest and settlement of Venezuela) considered one of the most important contemporary works on the history of the

Spanish Empire The Spanish Empire, sometimes referred to as the Hispanic Monarchy (political entity), Hispanic Monarchy or the Catholic Monarchy, was a colonial empire that existed between 1492 and 1976. In conjunction with the Portuguese Empire, it ushered ...

Venezuela Province The Venezuela Province (or Province of Caracas) was a province of the Spanish Empire (from 1527), of Gran Colombia (1824–1830) and later of Venezuela (from 1830), apart from an interlude (1528–1546) when it was contracted as a concession by t ...

. The work was published in Madrid in 1723, and based on research in the Empire's archives going back to Columbus.

References

1671 births 1738 deaths 18th-century Venezuelan historians Knights of Santiago Academic staff of the University of Salamanca Venezuelan legal scholars {{Venezuela-bio-stub