Angol is a commune and

capital city A capital city, or just capital, is the municipality holding primary status in a country, state (polity), state, province, department (administrative division), department, or other administrative division, subnational division, usually as its ...

of the

Malleco Province Malleco Province () is one of two provinces in the southern Chilean region of La Araucanía (IX). Its population as of the 2017 census is 205,124, and it covers an area of . The provincial capital is the city of Angol. Malleco Province is known ...

in the

Araucanía Region The Araucanía ( ), La Araucanía Region ( ) is one of Chile's 16 first-order administrative divisions, and comprises two provinces: Malleco in the north and Cautín in the south. Its capital and largest city is Temuco; other important cities ...

of southern

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

. It is located at the foot of the Cordillera de Nahuelbuta and next to the Vergara River, that permitted communications by small boats to the Bío-Bío River and Concepción. This strategic position explains the successive foundations of this city during the

Arauco War The Arauco War was a long-running conflict between colonial Spaniards and the Mapuche people, mostly fought in the Araucanía region of Chile. The conflict began at first as a reaction to the Spanish conquerors attempting to establish cities a ...

. It was first founded in 1553 as a "

conquistador Conquistadors (, ) or conquistadores (; ; ) were Spanish Empire, Spanish and Portuguese Empire, Portuguese colonizers who explored, traded with and colonized parts of the Americas, Africa, Oceania and Asia during the Age of Discovery. Sailing ...

fort A fortification (also called a fort, fortress, fastness, or stronghold) is a military construction designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from La ...

of ''Confines'', the fort was later destroyed and rebuilt several times and it was not until the Pacification of Araucania in the late 19th century that it was rebuilt with the name of Angol. The city has a current population of approximately 53,000. Within the

electoral divisions of Chile This article covers the electoral division of Chile, which involves two distinct systems: # Chamber of Deputies of Chile, Chamber of Deputies and Senate of Chile, Senate: Chile is divided into electoral districts and senatorial constituencies for ...

, it belongs to the 48th

electoral district An electoral (congressional, legislative, etc.) district, sometimes called a constituency, riding, or ward, is a geographical portion of a political unit, such as a country, state or province, city, or administrative region, created to provi ...

and the 14th senatorial circumscription.

History

Modern Angol was first founded in 1553 as the

fort of ''Los Confines'' by

Pedro de Valdivia Pedro Gutiérrez de Valdivia or Valdiva (; April 17, 1497 – December 25, 1553) was a Spanish ''conquistador'' and the first royal governor of Chile. After having served with the Spanish army in Italy and Flanders, he was sent to South America in ...

, the fort was later that year abandoned and destroyed by the Mapuche after the Battle of Tucapel. In 1560, the city was established by Governor García Hurtado de Mendoza with the name of ''San Andrés de Angol'', after his father the viceroy of Peru, the location to the north of the site of the old fort. It was commonly called ''Ciudad de Los Infantes'' for the infantrymen that had been assigned to build the city. It was attacked and destroyed in 1599, by the Mapuches following the Disaster of Curalaba. In 1611 the city was rebuilt by Luis Merlo de la Fuente a little more to the south with the name of ''San Luis de Angol'' but it did not prosper. In 1637 Governor Francisco Laso de la Vega, refounded it with the name of ''San Francisco de la Vega'', but in 1641, it was abandoned by the terms of the Peace of Quillin with the Mapuche. It was repopulated by Tomás Marín de Poveda in 1695, with the name of ''Santo Tomás de Colhue'', but it was attacked and destroyed again in the Mapuche Rising of 1723 and one last time in their rising in 1766, from which it never recovered. The present city of Angol was founded definitively by Cornelio Saavedra Rodríguez, on 6 December 1862 as a fortress and base for his campaign for the Pacification of Araucania. Declared a city in 1871, it was connected by railroad with Santiago in 1876. In 1881 it was the base for the final campaign of pacification. Subsequently, it was the economic and administrative center and departure point for the Chilean and foreign colonists that occupied the lands around it. Angol was affected by the 8.8 magnitude 27 February 2010 earthquake. A US military field hospital was deployed to the city to treat casualties from the tremblor and subsequent tsunami.UKPA
"Foreign hospitals help out Chile"
''6 March 2010'' (accessed 6 March 2010)

Líder Líder (Spanish for ''Leader'') is a Chilean hypermarket chain originally owned and operated by Distribución y Servicio (DyS) but sold to United States, US American corporation Walmart in 2009.

will be the first hypermarket to open business in the city while

Cencosud Cencosud S.A. is a publicly traded retail company based in Chile. It is the largest retail company in Chile and the third largest listed retail company in Latin America, competing with the Brazilian Companhia Brasileira de Distribuição and the ...

's Santa Isabel supermarkets is also considering entering the market.Dentro de los próximos días se inician obras de construcción del supermercado Lider de Angol
, Canaldenoticias

Demographics

According to the 2002

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

by the National Statistics Institute (''INE''), Angol spans and at that time had 48,996 inhabitants; of these, 43,801 (89.4%) lived in

urban area An urban area is a human settlement with a high population density and an infrastructure of built environment. Urban areas originate through urbanization, and researchers categorize them as cities, towns, conurbations or suburbs. In urbani ...

s and 5,195 (10.6%) in

rural area In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry are typically desc ...

s. At that time, there were 23,770 men and 25,226 women. The population grew by 6.0% (2,770 persons) between the 1992 and 2002 censuses.

Administration

As a commune, Angol is a third-level

administrative division of Chile The administrative division or territorial organization of Chile exemplifies characteristics of a unitary state. State administration is functionally and geographically decentralized, as appropriate for each authority in accordance with the law ...

administered by a

municipal council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, borough cou ...

, headed by an

alcalde ''Alcalde'' (; ) is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and Administration (government), administrative functions. An ''alcalde'' was, in the absence of a corregidor (position), corregidor, the presiding officer o ...

who is directly elected every four years. The 2008-2012 alcalde is Enrique Neira Neira (ILE). Within the

, Angol is represented in the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourb ...

by Nicolas Ardiles ( UDI) and Mario Venegas ( PDC) as part of the 48th electoral district, together with Renaico, Collipulli, Ercilla, Los Sauces, Purén, Lumaco and Traiguén. The commune is represented in the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

by Alberto Espina Otero ( RN) and Jaime Quintana Leal ( PPD) as part of the 14th senatorial constituency (Araucanía-North).

Climate

References

Sources

* Francisco Solano Asta-Buruaga y Cienfuegos
Diccionario geográfico de la República de Chile (Geographic dictionary of the Republic of Chile), New York, D. Appleton, 1899. pg. 36-37 "Angol (Ciudad de)" and "Angol Antigua, ó Los Confines (Ciudad de)"

External links

*
The community on internet
{{Authority control Communes of Chile Capitals of Chilean provinces Populated places established in 1553 Destroyed populated places 1599 disestablishments 1611 establishments in South America Populated places in Malleco Province 1553 establishments in the Spanish Empire