HISTORY. BMMOS AyI'Vs has played an impor tant part in South American history. Founded in 1335 by Don Pedro de Mendoza, it received fhe name of Ciudad de In Santisima Trinidad y Puerto the Santa hula Ile Buenos Ayres. after Our Lady the Virgin Mary of good airs or winds. After being twice destroyed by the natives, the city was firmly established in 1580. it suceess fully resisted attempts of the French and Dutch to capture it during the Seventeenth Century, and in 1776 it became the capital of the new viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata or Buenos Ayres. After driving out the English. who had taken the city by surprise, in 1806, the inhabi tants repelled another a clack in the following year. The congress proclaimed the inde pendence of the country from Spain on May 22, 1810, met here, and the city became capital of the Republic of the United Provinces of the River Plata in 1826. The port was blockaded by
the French and English in 1845. After the strug gle between Ilosas and Urquiza in 1851, Buenos Ayres seceded from the Republic, and till 1859 formed, with the surrounding province, a sepa rate State. Since that time the city has been part of the confederation, and, by a decree of 1SSO, has been definitely made the capital of Argentina and is divided from the province bear ing its name. In 1871 the city suffered a ter rible epidemic of yellow fever.
Consult.: Turner, Argentine and the Argen tines (New York, 1892) ; Bureau of the Ameri can Republics. Handbook of Argentine Republic, Bulletin ti7 (Washington, 1892) ; A nuarin esta distico de in cindad de Buenos Aires; Curtis, "Buenos Ayres." in The Chantauguan, Vol. XXIX. (Meadville, Pa., 1899).