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A GUIDE TO GAUCHOS

The gaucho is one of Argentina’s most potent symbols, loosely defined as a cowboy.

Originally wild, free horsemen of the pampas, semi-nomadic and often outlawed, the early gauchos saw themselves as honourable outsiders.

The arrival of barbed wire and refrigerated ships saw their territory carved into vast landholdings or estancias for cattle-rearing.

Wealth was transported in the form of horses (ideally a troop), silver coins on their belts, silver spurs and horse accoutrements.

Gauchos always carved the beef carcass in situ, taking the hide and as much meat as they could carry, some under their flat hide saddles.

They wear flat hats, loose trousers or

woven sashes with a knife stuck in the back, wrinkly leather boots or rope-soled

teamed with rawhide whips and – leather balls on rawhide cords.

They drink the herbal tea (ma-tay) from a gourd with a silver straw or heated in a pan.

Gaucho literature includes

(1872) by José Hernández and

(1969) by Ricardo Güiraldes.

Look out for red-draped shrines to the gauchos’ patron saint, Gauchito Gil, and for seasonal, regional fiestas.

pony in the procession; gauchos trotting along with their tropillas (horse troops), each troop following a madrina or “godmother” mare with a bell, turning them in tight circles at key points in the street to show their prowess and control.

The climax of the day was at the parade ground, where crowds picnicked around the boundaries, ringed by horseboxes, food stalls and country folk. It was like a point-topoint, except many riders were being catapulted off enraged horses at the rodeo post. It ended with the bit Belen loved, the entrevero, as the gauchos mixed their troops into a swirling melee of colour, 300 horses circling in search of their madrinas, and the whole mess resolving into its component parts. Order restored, there was a sense of closure. And the fiesta was over for another year.