Mirada de viajeros e historiografía: la campaña de Buenos Aires al concluir el s. XVIII

Abstract

This article reviews the accounts of Francisco de Amigorena and Alexander Gillespie, a functionary and soldier, written at the end of the 18th Century and beginning of the 19th Century. These accounts formed the basis of the traditional Argentinian historiography of the rural areas of Buenos Aires. From the perspective of the new economic historiography in Argentina and of rural history, the article rethinks the image of the structure of the dominant rural classes of the age and the economic role of the interior of the pampa of the province of Buenos Aires. Specifically, the article questions the idea of the countryside as a deserted space such as it had been depicted in the romantic historiography, and the article proposes the outline of a heterogeneous hinterland dedicated to several activities.