Edited by: Charles Jones, Dr. [University of Cambridge] and Geoff West [The British Library]

Published by Primary Source Microfilm

Editorial Board: Dr. David Rock, Department of History, University of California at Santa Barbara

In 1968 the British Library's Department of Printed Books acquired at auction a collection of 534 Latin American pamphlets and broadsides, the majority printed in the 19th century. Of these many date from the early years of independence and were published in the River Plate Region.

The greater part of the collection was formed by the Argentinean writer Luis López Domínguez (1810-98). He was a political journalist and historian and like many Latin American intellectuals he served also as a politician and ambassador. He was deputy and Minister of Economic Affairs both for the province of Buenos Aires and for Argentina. He represented his country in the United States, Spain and the United Kingdom. Other pamphlets in the collection belonged to the Argentinean Lorenzo López († 1833), also a deputy for Buenos Aires.

The majority of the documents concern politics or are official publications, e.g. of Argentina, Uruguay or the Province of Buenos Aires. Famous names recur: Bartolomé Mitre, Manuel Dorrego, Juan Manuel de Rosas, Esteban Echeverría, Domingo Sarmiento. Some of the earliest items were printed at the famous press of the Niños Expósitos (founded to finance a foundling home in Buenos Aires). One dates from 1784, some five years after its establishment, others from 1787, 1799 and 1807. The press became part of the Imprenta del Estado in 1825.

Countries represented in the collection besides Argentina are Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, Peru, Spain, Uruguay and the United States.

22 reels