Culture
Living culture
A bilingual country where Guaraní is spoken on the street, on the radio and at home. Ñandutí lace, harp, polka and guarania, myths still told and festivals handed down.
Guaraní farming peoples grow corn, cassava and beans in villages across the eastern region; the Chaco is home to hunting, fishing and gathering peoples from other language families. Their language, plants and knowledge remain part of everyday life.
The shipwrecked Portuguese sailor Aleixo García, with thousands of Guaraní warriors, crosses present-day Paraguay on his way to the lands of the Inca: he is the first European known to have reached the area.
On August 15, Juan de Salazar de Espinosa founds the fort of Nuestra Señora Santa María de la Asunción on the banks of the Paraguay River, making it one of the oldest cities in South America.
On September 16, Domingo Martínez de Irala establishes the town council (Cabildo) after the first Buenos Aires is abandoned. Asunción becomes the hub of the Spanish conquest of the River Plate region.
Expeditions set out from Asunción to found Santa Cruz de la Sierra (1561), Santa Fe (1573), the second Buenos Aires (1580, under Juan de Garay) and Corrientes (1588), among others.
With San Ignacio Guasú, the network of Jesuit-Guaraní mission towns is born, eventually numbering thirty across the region. Baroque art, music and workshops flourish for more than a century and a half.
Residents of Asunción, led by José de Antequera and later Fernando de Mompox, defy the authority of the viceroy and the Jesuits in one of the first self-rule movements in the Americas.
Charles III's order of 1767 expelling the Society of Jesus is carried out in the region. The missions decline; today the ruins of Trinidad and Jesús are UNESCO World Heritage Sites (1993).
On the night of May 14–15, a group of patriots confronts Governor Velasco in Asunción. Paraguay breaks away from Spain and Buenos Aires without bloodshed.
José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia rules as Supreme Dictator, later Perpetual Dictator. He isolates the country, controls trade and represses the elite; he remains a divisive figure to this day.
On November 25 a congress formally proclaims independence and adopts the tricolor flag, with a different emblem on each side.
Paraguay's first constitutional president opens up the country, hires foreign experts and promotes the Ybycuí ironworks (La Rosada), shipyards, the telegraph and schools.
The Asunción–Trinidad section of the railway opens, one of the first in South America; in December the line reaches Luque. Asunción's Central Station still displays a period locomotive today.
Paraguay fights Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. The war ends on March 1, 1870, at Cerro Corá with the death of Francisco Solano López, leaving the country devastated and its population drastically reduced.
On November 12, US President Rutherford B. Hayes rules in Paraguay's favor in its dispute with Argentina over the Chaco Boreal. In gratitude, Villa Occidental is renamed Villa Hayes.
In Asunción, José Asunción Flores creates a new genre of slow, melancholy song. Almost a century later, in 2024, UNESCO inscribes it on the list of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
Paraguay and Bolivia clash over the Chaco Boreal in South America's largest war of the 20th century. The armistice comes on June 12, 1935, and the peace treaty in 1938.
Alfredo Stroessner rules for 35 years with the Colorado Party, a period of infrastructure projects, repression and exile. The coup on the night of February 2–3, 1989, opens the transition to democracy.
Law 704 of July 5 grants women the same political rights as men. Paraguay is the last country in South America to do so.
Paraguay and Brazil sign the Itaipú treaty in 1973; the dam begins generating power in 1984. In 1982 its reservoir submerges the Guaíra Falls.
The Constitution of June 20, 1992, enshrines democracy and declares Paraguay a multicultural and bilingual country, with Guaraní and Spanish as official languages.
Fernando Lugo wins the election, ending more than six decades of Colorado Party governments. The peaceful handover of power is a democratic milestone.
UNESCO inscribes the practices and knowledge of tereré and pohã ñana (medicinal herbs). They are followed by the sixty-stripe poncho (2023), the guarania (2024) and ñai'ũpo pottery (2025).
Asunción hosts the 12th ODESUR South American Games from October 1 to 15, with delegations from all over South America.
From August 9 to 23, Asunción hosts the second Junior Pan American Games, with more than 4,000 athletes from 41 countries. On September 4, a draw against Ecuador sends the Albirroja, Paraguay's national team, to the World Cup after a 16-year absence.
At the World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada, Paraguay knocks out Germany on penalties in the round of 32 and falls 1–0 to France in the round of 16, on July 4 in Philadelphia.