María Parado de Bellido

María Parado de Bellido (5 July 1777 – 11 May 1822) was an indigenous Peruvian revolutionary during the struggle for independence from Spain.[1]

Painting of Maria Prado de Bellido, Artist unknown

Life

She was born in Ayacucho, also known as Huamanga.[2] She married Mariano Bellido when she was 15 years old.[3] Her husband and one of her sons were fighting for independence, and she passed on information about Spanish troop movements, dictating and signing her letters as she was illiterate. After one of her letters was intercepted by the Spanish she was captured and interrogated, but said she would rather die than betray her country: "no estoy aquí para informar a ustedes, sino para sacrificarme por la causa de la libertad". She was shot by the Spanish on 11 May 1822.[1]

She is considered a Peruvian heroine, and oral tradition has created several myths about her. It is said that General Carratala, in an attempt to persuade her to talk, ordered soldiers to burn down her home where her daughters lived, but that they were saved because local people warned them to escape; that she paused outside the church of Santo Domingo, on the way to her execution, to kneel and pray to the Virgin Mary; and that after her execution a priest claimed her body and buried it in consecrated ground at the church of La Merced.[1] It has been said that "Bellido has become a figure of near mythical proportions deeply interwoven with the Peruvian sense of nationhood".[2]

Fusilamiento de Maria Parado de Bellido ("The shooting of ...) by Consuelo Cisneros, 1929

She is commemorated in the name of María Parado de Bellido District in Callao Province of Peru. The painting Fusilamiento de María Parado de Bellido (The Shooting of ...) by Consuelo Cisnero (1929) is held in the National Museum of the Archaeology.[4] In 1975 a Peruvian postage stamp bore her portrait as part of a set of stamps for "Year of Peruvian Women".[5]

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References
  1. André, Nelly (2015). ""Les femmes, ces libératrices" ou la participation des femmes dans les luttes pour l'indépendence de l'Amérique latine". In Serme, Jean-Marc (ed.). 1812 in the Americas (in French). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. pp. 76–77. ISBN 9781443882934. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  2. Watson, Ian (2002). Negotiating Cultures: Eugenio Barba and the Intercultural Debate. Manchester University Press. p. 207. ISBN 978-0719061707. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  3. "María Parado de Bellido" (in Spanish). Adonde.com. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  4. "Heroínas en la guerra de la Independencia". La Republica (in Spanish). 24 September 2017. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  5. "Peru (page 21/55)". Stamp World. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
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