Ecuador, officially the Republic of Ecuador, is a country in northwestern South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and the Pacific Ocean on the west. Ecuador also includes the Galápagos Islands in the Pacific, about 1,000 kilometers (621 mi) west of the mainland. The country's capital is Quito, but its largest city is Guayaquil.
Demographic features of the population of Ecuador include population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.
The Ecuadorian Armed Forces is the national military force of Ecuador. The commander-in-chief is the President of Ecuador. The military is generally under civilian control, specifically the Ministry of National Defence. The Ecuadorian military of Ecuador has been involved in border disputes with Peru, and has provided military observers and troops to the United Nations since 1948.
Guayas is a coastal province in Ecuador. It is bordered to the west by Manabí, Santa Elena, and the Pacific Ocean ; to the east by Los Ríos, Bolívar, Chimborazo, Cañar, and Azuay; to the north by Los Ríos and Bolívar; and to the south by El Oro and the Pacific Ocean.
The different varieties of the Spanish language spoken in the Americas are distinct from each other as well as from those varieties spoken in the Iberian peninsula, collectively known as Peninsular Spanish and Spanish spoken elsewhere, such as in Africa and Asia. There is great diversity among the various Latin American vernaculars, and there are no traits shared by all of them which are not also in existence in one or more of the variants of Spanish used in Spain. A Latin American "standard" does, however, vary from the Castilian "standard" register used in television and notably the dubbing industry. Of the more than 498 million people who speak Spanish as their native language, more than 455 million are in Latin America, the United States and Canada in 2022. The total amount of native and non-native speakers of Spanish as of October 2022 exceeds 595 million.
Some of the regional varieties of the Spanish language are quite divergent from one another, especially in pronunciation and vocabulary, and less so in grammar.
The Second Ecuadorian–Peruvian War, known locally as the War of '41, was a South American border war fought between 5–31 July 1941. It was the first of three military conflicts between Ecuador and Peru during the 20th century.
Yeísmo is a distinctive feature of certain dialects of the Spanish language, characterized by the loss of the traditional palatal lateral approximant phoneme and its merger into the phoneme. It is an example of delateralization.
Caribbean Spanish is the general name of the Spanish dialects spoken in the Caribbean region. The Spanish language was introduced to the Caribbean in 1492 with the voyages of Christopher Columbus. It resembles the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands, and, more distantly, the Spanish of western Andalusia. With more than 25 million speakers, Spanish is the most widely spoken language in the Caribbean Islands.
The Ecuadorian–Peruvian territorial dispute was a territorial dispute between Ecuador and Peru, which, until 1928, also included Colombia. The dispute had its origins on each country's interpretation of what Real Cedulas Spain used to precisely define its colonial territories in the Americas. After independence, all of Spain's colonial territories signed and agreed to proclaim their limits in the basis of the principle of uti possidetis juris, which regarded the Spanish borders of 1810 as the borders of the new republics. However, conflicting claims and disagreements between the newly formed countries eventually escalated to the point of armed conflicts on several occasions.
The Guayaquil Conference was a meeting that took place on July 26-27, 1822 in the port city of Guayaquil between libertadors José de San Martín and Simón Bolívar to discuss the future of Peru, and South America in general. The conference is considered a turning point in the South American independence process.
Colombian Spanish is a grouping of the varieties of Spanish spoken in Colombia. The term is of more geographical than linguistic relevance, since the dialects spoken in the various regions of Colombia are quite diverse. The speech of the northern coastal area tends to exhibit phonological innovations typical of Caribbean Spanish, while highland varieties have been historically more conservative. The Caro and Cuervo Institute in Bogotá is the main institution in Colombia to promote the scholarly study of the language and literature of both Colombia and the rest of Spanish America. The educated speech of Bogotá, a generally conservative variety of Spanish, has high popular prestige among Spanish-speakers throughout the Americas.
The First Ecuadorian–Peruvian War took place between 1857 and 1860. The conflict began when Ecuador attempted to sell Amazon basin land claimed by Peru in order to settle a debt with British creditors. When diplomatic relations between the two countries broke down, prior to the fragmentation of the Ecuadorian government into several competing factions, the Peruvian government ordered a blockade of Ecuador's ports in order to force the cancellation of the sale, and the official acknowledgement of Peruvian ownership of the disputed territories. By late 1859, control of Ecuador was consolidated between General Guillermo Franco, in the city of Guayaquil, and a provisional government in Quito headed by Gabriel García Moreno. Peruvian President Ramón Castilla sailed to Guayaquil with several thousand soldiers in October 1859, and negotiated the Treaty of Mapasingue with General Franco in January 1860. The signing of the treaty indicated Ecuadorian compliance with all of Peru's demands, and temporarily marked the end of the territorial dispute between the two countries. However, in September 1860, the forces of the provisional government, commanded by García Moreno and General Juan José Flores defeated Franco's government at the Battle of Guayaquil, ending the civil war in Ecuador. The new government disavowed the Treaty of Mapasingue, followed shortly afterwards by its Peruvian counterpart; this re-opened the territorial dispute.
The military history of Ecuador spans hundreds of years.
The Ecuadorian Navy is an Ecuadorian entity responsible for the surveillance and protection of national maritime territory and has a personnel of 9,400 men to protect a coastline of 2,237 km which reaches far into the Pacific Ocean. The vessels are identified by a ship prefix of B.A.E.: Buque de la Armada del Ecuador or L.A.E.: Lancha de la Armada del Ecuador.
Andean Spanish is a dialect of Spanish spoken in the central Andes, from southern Colombia, with influence as far south as northern Chile and Northwestern Argentina, passing through Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. While similar to other Spanish dialects, Andean Spanish shows influence from Quechua, Aymara, and other indigenous languages, due to prolonged and intense language contact. This influence is especially strong in rural areas.
Spanish is the most-widely spoken language in Ecuador, though great variations are present depending on several factors, the most important one being the geographical region where it is spoken. The three main regional variants are:
Peruvian Spanish is a family of dialects of the Spanish language that have been spoken in Peru since brought over by Spanish conquistadors in 1532. There are five varieties spoken in the country, by about 94.4% of the population. The five Peruvian dialects are Andean Spanish, Peruvian Coastal Spanish, Andean-Coastal Spanish, Equatorial Spanish, and Amazonic Spanish.
The Free Province of Guayaquil was a South American state that emerged between 1820 and 1822 with the independence of the province of Guayaquil from the Spanish monarchy. The free province had a provisional government and constitution until its annexation by Gran Colombia in 1822. Its successor was the Department of Guayaquil forming part of Gran Colombia.
The Spanish province of Guayaquil had been separated from the Viceroyalty of Peru and in those days it only depended legally on the court of the Real Audiencia de Quito. About a decade later, the Departments of Guayaquil, Azuay, and Ecuador separated from Gran Colombia forming the current Ecuador.
