Five questions about Argentina – Quick Quiz answers

By British Expat, 31 March 2019

We asked you five questions about Argentina. Here come the answers!

1. In English the name “Argentina” is taken directly from the Spanish language. However, the Spanish name is itself derived from Italian. What does it mean?
   “Made of silver” or “silver-coloured”. The Spanish word for silver is “plata”, so conceivably the country might have been called Plateada. Before independence in 1816 it was known as the “Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata”; it didn’t settle on the name “Argentine Republic” until ten years later.
2. The song “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina” reached No.1 in the British singles charts in 1976. It was written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, and sung by Julie Covington. Which political leader was the subject of the song?
   Eva Perón, the wife of President Juan Perón from 1946 until her death in 1952 at the age of just 33. Loved by the poor, she remained a powerful rallying figure for them even after her death. Rice later described the lyrics as a “string of meaningless platitudes”, to convey an emotionally intense but empty speech by a “megalomaniac woman”.
3. Who or what are gauchos?
   Horsemen, but with the additional reputation from the 18th and 19th centuries of being noble, brave, generous and wily. These days the term “gaucho” is applied more generally to the rural working classes, but it’s still a major part of the Argentinian (and Uruguayan) self-image. The mascot of the 1978 FIFA World Cup was called Gauchito.
4. What percentage of Argentina’s population are literate?
   According to the 2010 census, the literacy rate among people aged 10 and over was 98.07%. Argentina has a long-standing record of excellence in public education, having established universal, compulsory, free and secular education in 1884.
5. The highest mountain in both the southern and western hemispheres is located in the Andes within Argentina. What is the name of that mountain?
   Aconcagua, which is 6,960.8 metres (22,837 ft) high. It’s just 15 km (9¼ miles) from the border with Chile. The nearest mountain that’s higher is Tirich Mir in the Hindu Kush, over 16,500 km (10,250 miles) away. That’s almost as far away as you can get without leaving Earth’s surface!

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