Summary: | In Latin America, women played decisive roles in the fights for independence, even in terms of military action and leadership; yet, in the nineteenth century, the emerging republics created male national heroes while no woman deserved such recognition. In the epic of Independence, the love between the heroes who founded the country and the women who worked in the backstage produced a history of power, war, politics and violence. The work of retrieving the specificity of this history is still in progress. This article focuses on two women of different social status who shared the common experiences of love, passion, hardship, loss, exile, and loneliness, in what is today the central province of Cordoba, Argentina: Delfina, the companion of the Supreme entrerriano Francisco Ramirez, and Margarita Weild, wife of General José María Paz. In both cases, the deeds that these women performed in the name of love and of the ideal they defended speak for the recognition they deserve.
|