Valcheta is a village and municipality in
Río Negro Province
Río Negro (, ''Black River'') is a province of Argentina, located in northern Patagonia. Neighboring provinces are from the south clockwise Chubut, Neuquén, Mendoza, La Pampa and Buenos Aires. To the east lies the Atlantic Ocean.
Its capi ...
in
Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
, seat of government of
Valcheta Department.
Ministerio del Interior
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History
Valcheta is one of the oldest settlements in Río Negro Province. On 5 October 1833, an advance column of the left-flank Rosa's Desert Campaign, under Sergeant Major Leandro Ibáñez, fought a skirmish with a native tribe under Cayupán who was camped near the local creek.
Before that time, the locality was called "río Chiquito" (Spanish ''for small river'') and that is how it was shown in maps of the time, among them the one published by Félix de Azara
Félix Manuel de Azara y Perera (18 May 1746 – 20 October 1821) was a Spanish military officer, naturalist, and engineer.
Life
Félix de Azara was born on 18 May 1746 in Barbunales, Aragon. He joined the army and attended a Spanish military ...
. The place was a local ground for the Gennakenk tribe before the Mapuche
The Mapuche ( (Mapuche & Spanish: )) are a group of indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina, including parts of Patagonia. The collective term refers to a wide-ranging ethnicity composed of various groups who s ...
invasion of the 19th Century.
The Argentine army built a small fort named "de Roa" at the site in 1883. From that date on European immigration mainly by Spaniards
Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance ethnic group native to Spain. Within Spain, there are a number of national and regional ethnic identities that reflect the country's complex history, including a number of different languages, both in ...
and Italians
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, regions = Italy 55,551,000
, region1 = Brazil
, pop1 = 25–33 million
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, colonized the region, with the town officially founded on 19 June 1889.
History of the name
Valcheta's site shows up in old maps also written as ''Balcheta'', ''Balchitas'', ''Valchitas''. Nonetheless, in the native Gennakenk language, the letter "v" did not exist which may have led to a misspelling in the official reports from the late 19th Century.
There are differing accounts on the meaning of the name. The most credible is the one suggested by anthropologist Rodolfo Casamiquela, meaning "creek that overflows", referring to the frequent flooding in the valley before Europeans built canals.
Geography
Valcheta, in the valley of the creek of the same name, is an oasis, as it sits in the middle of the semi-arid Patagonian plateau but has different environments, having woods-like vegetation, fruit-tree plantations, and alfalfa crops irrigated by the creek.
Coming from the eastern coast it is the first prominent local population center due to the fertile valley and fruit and vegetable farming.
Population
According to the 2020 Census it has 6500 inhabitants which represents an increase of 4.2% from the 3,413 in the previous Census of 1991.
Climate
It is cold and arid, with low precipitation of no more than per year. Average temperature in January (Summer) is and in July (Winter) .
References
External links
Los Viajeros de Valcheta, by Jorge Castañeda
Provincial Website
Populated places in Río Negro Province
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