Antonio Caballero y Góngora

Antonio Caballero y Góngora (in full, Antonio Pascual de San Pedro de Alcántara Caballero y Góngora) (24 May 1723 in

In Spain and New Spain

Antonio Caballero was born into a hidalgo family in Córdoba. His parents were Juan Caballero y Espinar and Antonia de Góngora. He studied first in Córdoba. At the age of 15 he received a scholarship to study theology in the Colegio de San Bartolomé y Santiago in Granada. He continued his studies at the Colegio Imperial de Santa Catalina, graduating in 1744. He was ordained a priest on 19 September 1750. About this time he wrote a biography of the Granadan poet José Antonio Porcel y Salablanca.

In 1753 he was named canon of the cathedral of Córdoba, where he remained until 1775. He was a cultured man and a lover of the arts. He collected paintings by Velázquez, Rubens, Titian, etc., and his library contained the most modern works on all branches of knowledge. He was also a numismatist.

He was named

Archbishop of Bogotá

In 1777 he was named

He did much important pastoral work. He reformed the system of tithes and founded the sees of Mérida (Venezuela) and Cuenca (Quito). He was unsuccessful in founding a see at Antioquia and in placing the diocese of Panama under the jurisdiction of Bogotá (instead of Lima). Neither was he able to organize a provincial council of New Granada, as he had hoped.

Revolt of the Comuneros

In 1780 the

His efforts to modernize the viceroyalty were of great importance. He stimulated the economy, industry and the arts, and greatly assisted the Royal Botanical Expedition of 1783, under José Celestino Mutis. In 1782 and 1783 he had to deal with an epidemic of smallpox. In 1783 the interim character of his appointment was removed, and he became viceroy in his own right. In October 1784 he went to Cartagena to settle the Indian population in towns, and to suppress an Indigenous rebellion in Darién and promote colonization there. The latter project was not successful. He founded new missions in Casanare and San Martín.

In 1787 he asked to be relieved of his positions, and the king granted his request the following year.

In 1788 he was appointed bishop of Córdoba. He sailed for Spain in April 1789. In Córdoba, he founded the School of Fine Arts and donated his art collection to the city.

Antonio Caballero y Góngora died in Córdoba in 1796.

The genus Gongora, a type of orchid with most species found in Colombia, was named after him.

Ancestors

Citations

References

• Bowman, Charles H. Jr. (September 1971). "Antonio Caballero y Góngora y Manuel Torres: La Cultura en la Nueva Granada". Boletín de Historia y Antigüedades (in Spanish). 58: 413–452.
• Caballero y Góngora, Antonio (1989). "Relación del estado del Nuevo Reino de Granada, año de 1789". In Colmenares, German (ed.). Relaciones e informes de los gobernantes de la Nueva Granada (in Spanish). Bogotá: Banco Popular.
  ISBN 958-9003-36-2
  .
• Pérez Ayala, José Manuel (1951). Antonio Caballero y Góngora, virrey y arzobispo de Santafé (in Spanish). Bogotá: Ediciones del Concejo de Bogotá.
• Restrepo Saenz, José María (1952). Biografías de mandatarios y ministros de la Real Audiencia (1671 a 1819) (in Spanish). Bogotá: cademia Colombiana de Historia.

• Kuethe, Allan J. (1978). Military Reform and Society in New Granada, 1773–1808. University Press of Florida.
  ISBN 978-0-8130-0570-6
  .
• Phelan, John Leddy (1978). The People and the King: The Comunero Revolution in Colombia, 1781. University of Wisconsin Press.
  ISBN 978-0-299-07290-2
  .

• (in Spanish) Short biography
• (in Spanish) Short biography
• (in Spanish) Brief biography
• Ecclesiastical appointments