- Tucapel
Tucapel was a region of
Araucania named for theTucapel River , it now lies within theArauco Province , of theBiobío Region ofChile .The region gave its name to the Mapuche people of the area, who were famed for their long resistance to the Spanish in the Arauco War. Tucapel is also the name of a famous leader in the first resistance against the Spanish mentioned in Ercilla's "
La Araucana ".The fortress of San Diego de Alcalá de Tucapel was founded by
Pedro de Valdivia in 1552 on a hill in the valley of the Tucapel River at the present location of the city ofCañete, Chile . Near here, the conqueror died after being surprised and defeated at theBattle of Tucapel byLautaro , after he had arrived to relieve the fortress, which Lautaro had already destroyed on 25 December, 1552.In 1557, the fortress and the later city of "Cañete de la Frontera" were later rebuilt three kilometers to the west of the present location of the city and resisted an attack by Toqui
Caupolicán . It was finally abandoned after theBattle of Curalaba in the Mapuche Uprising of 1598.The present city of Cañete was founded on the 12th of November of 1868 by colonel
Cornelio Saavedra Rodriguez as part of thepacification of Araucanía .Source
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=CYYCAAAAYAAJ&printsec=titlepage#PPA533,M1 Francisco Solano Asta-Buruaga y Cienfuegos, Diccionario geográfico de la República de Chile, SEGUNDA EDICIÓN CORREGIDA Y AUMENTADA, NUEVA YORK, D. APPLETON Y COMPAÑÍA. 1899.] Pg. 846-847, Tucapel.
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