Hail, oh homeland

Hail, oh homeland! is the National Anthem of the Republic of Ecuador. It consists of six verses and a chorus, of which only the second verse and the chorus are sung. Its lyrics were written by Juan León Mera and its music was composed by the French composer Antonio Neumane, who was inspired by the Hymn to Pius IX by Gaetano Magazzari. The hymn had some reform projects until it reached its final fixation and intangibility in 1948. It was officially premiered on August 10, 1870 during the second presidency of Gabriel García Moreno.

It is the patriotic musical composition that represents the country and, together with the flag and the shield, has the category of patriotic symbol. The complete version is considered the most offensive hymn in the world towards another country, attacking in the Ecuadorian case to Spain in practically all the stanzas. For this reason, it has been considered at different times in history to modify the lyrics, given the good relations that exist between both countries.

Authors

Antonio Neumane Marno, composer of the music of the National Anthem of Ecuador.

The Ambateño poet Juan León Mera Martínez (born June 28, 1832) wrote the lyrics of the National Anthem of Ecuador. He then sent him to the Frenchman Antonio Neumane Marno (born June 13, 1819 ) to add music. The best-known interpretation of the Ecuadorian National Anthem was recorded by the Quito City Choir

Juan León Mera Martínez, author of the letter of the National Anthem of Ecuador.

History

At the beginning of the Republic, between 1830 and 1832, the Guayaquil bard José Joaquín de Olmedo wrote a National Song (with a chorus and four stanzas) in homage to the nascent Ecuadorian State. This creation, suggested by the first president of Ecuador, General Juan José Flores, was not set to music nor was it widely disseminated. A hymn with the title of Ecuadorian Song (six stanzas) was published in the Government Gazette of Ecuador no. 125 of December 28, 1833. The work indicates 1830 as the year of its creation, but it is by an anonymous author and was not officialized. In 1838, a National Song (with chorus and five stanzas) appears included in the brochure Poesías del General Flores en su retiro de La Elvira, published by the Government Printing Office. In a later edition it presents changes in its third stanza. For historians, it is the second National Song that is known. However, it was during the Government of Gabriel García Moreno that the project of adopting a national anthem came to fruition. In 1860, García Moreno had reestablished the tricolor of Gran Colombia as the national flag, after defeating the secessionists of Guayaquil, led by Guillermo Franco, and abolishing the bicolor flag that they had imposed in 1845. García Moreno also used them as weapons of the Republic to the shield that was already in force since 1845, but added the tricolor flag, which is how it is currently represented. Within this framework, in 1865, the Argentine musician Juan José Allende, who collaborated with the Ecuadorian Army, presented to the National Congress a project for the musicalization of Olmedo's lyrics from 1830, but it was not sufficiently well received.

In November 1865, at the express request of the president of the Senate, Nicolás Espinosa, the Ambateño poet Juan León Mera Martínez, then secretary of said function of the State, wrote and delivered the lyrics of the National Anthem, which after being known by the congressmen it is sent to Guayaquil for the French maestro Antonio Neumane to put music on it. On January 16, 1866, the complete version of the lyrics by Juan León Mera was published in the Quito weekly El Sud Americano.

Adoption

However, he had to wait until 1870 for the premiere of the National Anthem of Ecuador, in the Plaza de la Independencia in Quito, on August 10. The performance was in charge of the band of Battalion No. 2 and the Pablo Ferreti Lyric Company, directed by Antonio Neumane. The key was B flat major (with score for solo tenor). The current 16-bar introduction was composed by Domingo Brescia and Enrique Marconi in 1901. The National Anthem of Ecuador is currently played in the key of E Major. But the lyrics of the Anthem were not to everyone's liking. Some sectors protested the anti-Spanish tone of the lyrics, conceived to pay homage to the heroes of the Diez de Agosto in 1809 and to condemn the attack by the Spanish fleet against the Pacific nations in 1865. In 1888, Juan León Mera responded to the insistence of change the lyrics of the National Anthem by saying: "I will not change the lyrics of the national anthem because it is not a bill of exchange."

Juan Leon Mera

Criticism of the Anthem continued until 1913, when the writer and diplomat from Guayaquil, Víctor Manuel Rendón Pérez, proposed a new anthem with lyrics adapted to the music of Antonio Neumane, but finally the Legislature rejected the proposal. Dr. José Miguel García Moreno, Minister of Education in the government of Carlos Julio Arosemena Tola, commissioned in 1947 the Jesuit priest Aurelio Espinosa Pólit and Juan León Mera Iturralde, son of the Tungurahuan bard, to study and compare the versions that were known. The debate, however, ended in 1948, when Congress declared the Anthem intangible in lyrics and music. Nowadays for this reason generally only the second verses and choruses are sung.

Officialization of the current National Anthem

After a careful study, the commissioners finally recommend the issuance of a decree that declares the National Anthem of Ecuador intangible with the lyrics of Juan León Mera Martínez.

The National Congress of Ecuador declared the verses of the Ambateño author an Official and intangible Anthem, dated September 29, 1948. The Executive sanctioned the legislative decree on November 8 and in Official Gazette no. said letter was published in November. He was President of the Gallic Republic Plaza Lasso. National Anthem Day at that time was November 8.

On the completion, in 1965, of the first centenary of the lyrics of the National Anthem, the Military Government Junta that governed the country proceeded to declare November 26 of each year as the Day of the National Anthem of Ecuador. The decree was issued on November 24. The dictatorship of the Supreme Government Council, by decree of March 11, 1977, provides for the suppression of certain repetitions in the National Anthem in order to make it less extensive.

On March 15, 2001, the National Congress declared the officiality and intangibility of the lyrics and music of the Anthem, with the key in E major in the introduction, chorus, verse and chorus.

Inclusion of the National Anthem in the list of intangible heritage of Ecuador

By administrative resolution no.

Translation

Within the Ecuadorian constitution, the Kichwa language is recognized as the official language of intercultural relations. The National Anthem has a version in this language, thanks to the translation made by Pedro Bahua Huacho, from Colta, in the province of Chimborazo, which was completed in 1967. Since then, this text has undergone changes by of indigenous Quichua, although the main idea remains.

Hail, oh homeland official lyrics

National Anthem of the Republic of Ecuador

Analysis of lyrics

In 1865, when Roque Díaz A is commissioned to write the Anthem, Ecuador is governed by President Gabriel García Moreno. Despite his neocolonial flirtations with France, a country he asked to accept Ecuador as a protectorate, García Moreno, once in power, was concerned with strengthening the Ecuadorian State, centralizing the Government in Quito and limiting both local powers and the secessionist aspirations, especially from Guayaquil.

The officialization of national symbols, which began in 1860, was a step in that direction. García Moreno, related to the old noble families of Quito who had participated in the August 10, 1809, took care of promoting the memory of the First Cry of Independence, as a founding fact of Ecuador.

Another aspect also influenced the writing of the lyrics of the National Anthem. Ecuador, like other countries in the region, was officially at war with Spain, since the former metropolis had sent a fleet to attack Chile and Peru, in the framework of the Spanish-South American War and it was feared that the expedition of Madrid's punishment had the desire to reconquer the countries of the Pacific coast.

The chorus of the Anthem describes the Ecuadorian Homeland and its attributes. It begins with a greeting in the Roman manner: "Hail, oh fatherland, a thousand times, oh fatherland, glory to you", to later describe it as a land of peace and happiness: "your chest is overflowing, joy and peace" at the same time that he alludes to the equinoctial sun and the ancient pre-Hispanic beliefs of sun worship, when he affirms: "and your radiant forehead, more than the sun we contemplate shining".

The markedly anti-Spanish tone begins in the first stanza, which, when referring to colonial times, says: "the unjust and horrendous misfortune, which weighed fatally on you". Several stanzas are written with this anti-Spanish accent, but there is no direct allusion to pre-Hispanic cultures in the Hymn, but exclusively to the wars of Independence. Likewise, the Anthem reiterates the pacifist character of Ecuador, since the war it invokes is exclusively in defense of its freedom and sovereignty, never of aggression or conquest.

The first stanza also recalls "the yoke that the Iberian audacity imposed on you", to which the sons of the Homeland (in this case, the heroes of Diez de Agosto) commit themselves to the "revenge of the bloody monster" and the breaking of "the servile yoke."

In the second stanza, the heroes of Diez de Agosto are again alluded to, who are identified as "the first, the sons of the soil that the Pichincha superbly decorates" (this land is Quito). There is also an allusion to August 2, 1810, when the Spanish massacred the rebellious people of Quito: "and they shed their blood for you./ God looked and accepted the holocaust/ and that blood was a fertile seed/&# 3. 4;. The allusion then extends to Ecuadorians from other cities, such as Guayaquil and Cuenca, who later joined the process of Independence: "Other heroes that the world stunned/ saw thousands emerge around you.&# 3. 4;

The third stanza poetically describes the Battle of Pichincha, where Ecuadorians from all regions and Americans from various countries finally defeated the Spanish and put an end to the Royal Audience of Quito. The battle, which took place on the slopes of the Pichincha volcano, is remembered with these verses "Of those heroes to the iron arm / nothing had the earth invincible / and from the valley (refers to the Coast) to the highest sierra, the roar of the fight was heard.

The libertarian character of the Battle is remembered in this way: "victory flew after the fight / freedom came after the triumph / and the lion (representing Spain) could be heard / roaring with impotence and spite&# 3. 4;.

The fourth stanza recalls the legacy of freedom of independence, and, in the face of the new Hispanic aggression, warns about the willingness of Ecuadorians to defend, then and forever, their sovereignty: "hoy, oh Homeland!, your free existence / is the noble and magnificent inheritance / that happy heroism gave us / no one tries to take it from us now / nor our wrath to excite avenger / want, foolish or audacious, against itself.

The fifth stanza reiterates Ecuador's defiant stance against the Spanish attempt to reconquer: "Come the striking iron and lead /that the idea of war and revenge/ awakens the heroic strength /that made the fierce Spanish will succumb".

Finally, the sixth stanza presents an invocation to the Ecuadorian volcanoes, represented by the Pichincha, so that, in the event of a foreign invasion, they destroy the country so that the invader cannot appropriate it; it is an allusion to nationalism to rebel against the invader and the tyrant; offering his life if necessary: "And if new chains prepare / the injustice of barbaric luck / great Pichincha! you anticipate the death / of the Homeland and its children at last; / plunge immediately into your deep bowels / everything that exists in your land, the tyrant / tread only ashes and in vain / look for traces of being with you & # 3. 4;.

In this stanza, one could also find an allusion to the resistance of the natives to the Spanish conquerors, since in 1534 the Tungurahua volcano erupted, while Rumiñahui burned down the city of Quito so as not to leave it to Sebastián de Benalcázar's troops.

Use

The Ecuadorian National Anthem is performed on solemn occasions, at official public events, and at minor ceremonies, such as soccer games or school events in the morning. It is executed when the sessions of the National Assembly are installed, in solemn acts in the Carondelet Palace and in civil and military ceremonies and in normal ceremonies. The best known and most played recording is the one made by the Ciudad de Quito Choir

A short version is used as part of the honors to the President of Ecuador and is performed after the bugle blast.

It is also broadcast at the beginning and end of public and private television and radio transmissions.

Every morning at 06:00 on the radio stations and television channels, in the stadium when the national team plays, on Mondays in the educational centers during the civic minute, our National Anthem sounds. But this melody, exalted as a national symbol and which celebrates its classic day every November 26, had several projects until it sounded as we know it now.