Montenegro is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

of the state of

Rio Grande do Sul Rio Grande do Sul (, ; ; "Great River of the South") is a Federative units of Brazil, state in the South Region, Brazil, southern region of Brazil. It is the Federative units of Brazil#List, fifth-most populous state and the List of Brazilian s ...

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

. As of 2022, it has 64,322 inhabitants. The town was established in 1847 to be settled primarily by German immigrants from the

Hunsrück The Hunsrück () is a long, triangular, pronounced mountain range, upland in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is bounded by the valleys of the Moselle (river), Moselle-Saar (north-to-west), the Nahe (south), and the Rhine (east). It is continued ...

region of southwest Germany. The local language was

Riograndenser Hunsrückisch Hunsrik (natively ''Hunsrik'' , ''Hunsrückisch'' or ''Hunsrickisch'' and Portuguese ''hunsriqueano'' or ''hunsriqueano riograndense''), also called Riograndese Hunsrik, ' or ', is a Moselle Franconian language derived primarily from the Hunsr� ...

for most of its history, and it is still spoken there after 150 years of the initial settlement. Today, however, Portuguese prevails, mostly as a result of the campaign of the " Nacionalização" (''Nationalization'') forcefully imposed on all German and Italian settled areas of southern Brazil by president and dictator

Getúlio Vargas Getúlio Dornelles Vargas (; ; 19 April 1882 – 24 August 1954) was a Brazilian lawyer and politician who served as the 14th and 17th president of Brazil, from 1930 to 1945 and from 1951 until his suicide in 1954. Due to his long and contr ...

in the 1940s.

Railway connection

In 1909 a new railway line connected Montenegro to

São Leopoldo São Leopoldo () (Portuguese for ''Saint Leopold'') is a Brazilian industrial city located in the south state of Rio Grande do Sul. Geography It occupies a total area of 103.9 km2 (around 80 km2 urban area) at ''circa'' 30 km fr ...

, which led to a quickening of economic development both in Montenegro itself and in other regional municipalities such as Maratá, Salvador do Sul and

Barão Barão is a municipality in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. It includes the districts Arroio Canoas, Francesa Alta, General Neto and Francesa Baixa. Barão is 80 km from Porto Alegre. The municipality is bordered by Carlos Barbosa ( ...

. The railway was extended in 1932 and again in 1950, but at the end of the 1960s it was closed. It was subsequently decided to convert the former railway station into a "Cultural Center".

Distinguished sons and daughters

Cardinal Cardinal or The Cardinal most commonly refers to * Cardinalidae, a family of North and South American birds **''Cardinalis'', genus of three species in the family Cardinalidae ***Northern cardinal, ''Cardinalis cardinalis'', the common cardinal of ...

Cláudio Hummes Cláudio Hummes (; born Auri Alfonso Hummes; 8 August 1934 – 4 July 2022) was a Brazilian prelate of the Catholic Church. He was prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy from 2006 to 2010, having served as Archbishop of Fortaleza from 19 ...

, one of the candidates to the Catholic Church papacy in April 2005, was born in the area. On July 2, 2008,

Pope Benedict XVI Pope BenedictXVI (born Joseph Alois Ratzinger; 16 April 1927 – 31 December 2022) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 19 April 2005 until his resignation on 28 February 2013. Benedict's election as p ...

erected the new Roman Catholic Diocese of Montenegro, making it a Suffragan See in the province of the metropolitan archdiocese of

Porto Alegre Porto Alegre (, ; , ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Brazilian Federative units of Brazil, state of Rio Grande do Sul. Its population of roughly 1.4 million inhabitants (2022) makes it the List of largest cities in Brazil, 11th-most p ...

, from whose territory it was taken.

References

Municipalities in Rio Grande do Sul {{RioGrandedoSul-geo-stub

Railway connection

Distinguished sons and daughters

See also

References