Colonial Fault Lines and the Ruptures of Chilean Independence: Earthquakes, Reason, and Religion in the Polemic between Camilo Henríquez and Tadeo Silva

Abstract

During Chilean independence, a polemic between fray Camilo Henríquez and Dominican Tadeo Silva over the causes of earthquakes and religious processions filled the pages of periodicals and pamphlets. After the 1812 Venezuela and 1822 Valparaíso earthquakes, Henríquez published articles in the newspapers he edited—La Aurora de Chile and Mercurio de Chile—arguing that earthquakes were nothing more than a natural phenomenon and urged the state to regulate bloody religious processions.