A Sevillian who arrived in Coro in 1545 with Juan de Carvajal, whose consort she was. One of the first settlers of El Tocuyo. After Carvajal's execution, she had relationships with several conquistadors. She died in Caracas at age 83, called "the last of the conquistadors."
A Sevillian in the conquest
Catalina de Miranda was born in Seville in 1527. She arrived in Coro on January 1, 1545 —at barely 18 years old— in the same fleet that brought Juan de Carvajal, royal scribe. The chronicles describe her as Carvajal's consort (concubine) and one of the few women who accompanied the founding expedition of El Tocuyo at the end of that same year.
When Carvajal founded El Tocuyo on December 7, 1545, Catalina was among the first settlers of the city. She was 18, foreign-born, and lived in a newly founded outpost surrounded by jungle, indigenous peoples, and conquistadors —an unimaginable setting for a young Andalusian woman of her era.
A survivor of the founding tragedy
In May 1546, Carvajal ordered the execution of Philipp von Hutten and Bartholomeus Welser VI. Four months later, in September 1546, Carvajal himself was hanged on the orders of judge Juan Pérez de Tolosa.
Catalina, in effect a widow, did not remain alone. Colonial historiography presents her as a woman of great intelligence and charm, capable of moving in the complex world of the conquistadors. She maintained relationships —according to the chronicles— with several of the most powerful men of the fledgling Province of Venezuela:
- Juan de Villegas, founder of Barquisimeto and governor of the province.
- Diego García de Paredes, founder of Trujillo.
- And other officers and encomenderos whose names are lost to the archives.
Her contemporaries called her —not without malice— "the first courtesan of Venezuela."
Marriage and resettlement
Eventually Catalina married Francisco Ramos de Argañaras, an encomendero. She then lived in different cities of the territory being conquered: Borburata, Trujillo, and finally Caracas. Her biography —in fact— is a map of the very conquest of Venezuela.
Death and memory
She died in Caracas in 1610 at the age of 83. By the time she died, the generation of the conquistadors had already passed: she had outlived nearly all the men of the founding, including the Welsers, Carvajal, Villegas, García de Paredes, and the governors who followed. For that reason she came to be called "the last of the conquistadors."
Catalina de Miranda in literature
Catalina's figure inspired the historical novel "Catalina de Miranda" by Xiomary Urbáez (Editorial Planeta), one of the most thoroughly researched modern literary recreations of the conquest of Venezuela. Her name also appears in the works of chroniclers such as Oviedo y Baños and in academic studies of the female presence in the conquest.
Her historical significance
Catalina de Miranda is important to El Tocuyo not only because she was one of the first settlers, but because her biography offers a unique testimony: the female, anonymous, and surviving gaze on the great founding events of Venezuelan history. In a history written almost exclusively by men and about men, she occupied a space of her own for 65 years.
Her name, today, is one of the few that directly connects the founding of El Tocuyo to a living, complex, and documented person —not just to a charter or a decree.