BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (CN) — Thousands of Argentines filtered into the main square of Buenos Aires, Plaza de Mayo, to celebrate the May 25 patriotic holiday that commemorates the first national government independent of the Spanish Empire in 1810.
The day was packed with celebrations and cultural events around the country. In the capital of Buenos Aires, the focal point was the Cabildo, the former colonial seat of power and the site of the May Revolution
“Undoubtedly, it is the most important holiday in terms of the construction of national identity,” said Argentine sociologist Adrián Berardi. “At the same time, it is the prelude to independence and in that sense, national construction. That’s to say that May 25 is the foundation stone of what we are as a country.”
There are other key dates marking the birth of the Argentine nation, such as Independence Day on July 9, “but there was an effort on the part of the political leadership of the time to build May 25 as an epic and key moment in our history,” added Berardi.
The date is steeped in national traditions, with food fueling patriotic feelings. Bowls of locro — a thick stew of corn, meat, pumpkin and potatoes dating back to pre-Columbian civilizations in the Andes — are served up across the country. The recipe spread across the country during the War of Independence by gauchos, skilled and nomadic horsemen who would rise to the rank of national folk symbols. As a national dish of Argentina, these ingredients are chopped up and prepared for every national holiday.
“No matter what, I always make locro,” said Agustín Valdez, an Argentine and resident of Buenos Aires. “It is very much associated with the gaucho customs, from the countryside. Food has a very important role in our culture and getting together to eat something very national and popular is the best way of celebrating May 25 for me.”
The day serves as a moment to try and foster broad national unity in a country with deep political divides. “The day is a great occasion when we collectively come together to celebrate being Argentines,” Valdez said. “We don’t usually have much patriotic feeling and so the 25 is the day when we show the most pride in our country and our traditions. We all wear cockades, hang our flags out and celebrate. Personally, it also brings back many memories of school events and parades in my childhood.”
For Berardi, there remains a cultural tension between the meaning of the events of two centuries ago. “In my opinion, beyond a general national identity, May 25 is not an element of unity because its symbolic and cultural value differs according to the political positioning, class if you will, assumed by each Argentine,” said Berardi.
“I don’t believe that this date claims the union of the nation and patriotic feeling. There are nuances depending on which sector makes that reading, and it works more as an identity device, i.e., a fiction of unity.”
In 1810, the weeklong revolutionary events ending on May 25 accelerated national sentiment that would lead to the long birth of the Argentine nation after four centuries of Spanish colonial rule. As renowned Argentine historian Felipe Pigna described it: “May 25 represents the beginning of the long road to independence.”
The sense of nationalism was stoked years earlier by successfully defending multiple British invasions in 1806 and 1807 that attempted to seize control of Buenos Aires. With little help from the Spanish forces, local militias organized to repel the invasions, planting a sense of self-determination. Three years later, with news of Napoleon’s advancement into Spain, the elite of Buenos Aires found their moment to call for an open cabildo, a town hall meeting, to discuss and vote on the legitimacy of the colonial viceroy and a new form of government.
The result was the Primera Junta, the first patriot government, that ruled over the Provinces of the River Plate, which covered modern-day Buenos Aires as well as parts of northern Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Uruguay. Although it never declared independence, claiming to rule in the name of the absent king of Spain, the May Revolution immediately triggered the War of Independence that would last until 1818.
While separating from the chains of the Spanish Empire, internal debates over which form of government the newborn nation would take mutated into conflict before descending onto the battlefield in a new war, the Argentine Civil War, which simmered for six decades until 1880.
The highly centralized apparatus of the empire had left Buenos Aires with a monopoly over ports and international trade. As such, the country was born with a power imbalance.
Argentina's civil war was fought by the Unitarians, who proposed a centralized system with authority over the provinces, and the Federalists, who favored a decentralized federation of provinces and a central government with limited powers. The conflict culminated in the writing of a federal constitution in 1853 and the eventual federalization of Buenos Aires in 1880, which separated the city from the province of Buenos Aires and assigned it the national capital.
It took 70 years to unshackle the Provinces of the River Plate from its colonial chains and be forged into the federal republic of Argentina — from the revolutionary days of May, two wars and political reorganizing to the redrawing of its borders.
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