Indigenous territoriality and official colonization policies: the cases of Azul and Tapalqué on the southern border of Buenos Aires (19th century)

Abstract

The aim of this work is to make a first joint analysis of the policies of land occupation and frontier colonization carried out by the government of Buenos Aires province – later State of Buenos Aires- in which it concerns both criollo and indigenous populations settled in the countryside. Attention is focused in the Southern end of the province, Tapalqué and Azul region, in where two peculiarities converged: the delivery of medium portions of land to criollo settlers and a concentration of indigenous population that surpassed widely the amount of “white” neighbors. The importance of indigenous and farmer´s territoriality into the implementation of official devices for borderland expansion is rescued, framed by the reinforcement of the state sovereignty and the productive articulation towards the external market. The changes and continuities from the start of the regional colonization at the beginning of 19th century, up to the unification of the national State by the end of that century, are also marked.