Venezuela States (original) (raw)

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Updates:

James Nealis indicated a site where I was able to find 2011 census data.

Update 15 to the GEC, the successor to the FIPS standard, is dated 2014-03-31. It changes the status of Delta Amacuro from federal territory to state.

Paraskevas Renesis informs me that Venezuela has created a new administrative unit called Francisco de Miranda. Its status is territorio insular (island territory), and it consists of three island groups of Dependencias Federales: the archipi�lagos Los Roques, La Orchila, and Las Aves. This is not all of Dependencias Federales, but contains more than three quarters of their population. It's not clear how this territory fits into the administrative division hierarchy of Venezuela. For now, I will consider Dependencias Federales to remain as a primary and secondary subdivision, since the parts of it that are not included in Francisco de Miranda have no separate administration that I can find out.

Update 1 to the U.S. standard "Geopolitical Entities and Codes" is dated 2010-08-20. It changes the name of Distrito Federal to Distrito Capital.

ISO 3166-2 Newsletter number II-1, dated 2010-02-03, changes the country name to Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

ISO 3166-2 Newsletter number I-4, dated 2002-12-10, shows the new state of Vargas. ISO 3166-2 Newsletter number I-5, dated 2003-09-05, changes the status of Amazonas and Delta Amacuro from territories to states, correcting an error that has persisted since the original draft standard of 1996. Change Notice 6 to FIPS PUB 10-4, published on 2001-01-28, also shows Vargas as a new state.

FIPS PUB 10-4 is the U.S. Federal standard for administrative divisions of countries. Change 1 to FIPS PUB 10-4 is dated 1998-12-01. One of the changes is to the status of two divisions of Venezuela. Amazonas and Delta Amacuro have been changed from territorios (territories) to estados (states).

Country overview:

Venezuela has been independent during the entire 20th century. In 1953, a new constitution changed the name of the country from Estados Unidos de Venezuela to Rep�blica de Venezuela.

Other names of country:

1. Danish: Venezuela
2. Dutch: Venezuela, Bolivarische Republiek Venezuela (formal)
3. English: Republic of Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (formal)
4. Finnish: Venezuela
5. French: Venezuela m
6. German: Venezuela n
7. Icelandic: Venes�ela
8. Italian: Venezuela m
9. Norwegian: Venezuela, Republikken Venezuela
10. Portuguese: Venezuela, Rep�blica de Venezuela, Rep�blica f Bolivariana da Venezuela f (formal)
11. Russian: Боливарианская Республика Венесуэла (formal)
12. Spanish: Venezuela, Rep�blica f Bolivariana de Venezuela f (formal)
13. Swedish: Venezuela
14. Turkish: Bolivarcı Venezuela Cumhuriyeti (formal)

Origin of name:

Spanish for little Venice, because early explorers found inhabitants living in stilt houses in lakes

Primary subdivisions:

Venezuela is divided into 23 estados (states), one dependencias federales (federal dependencies), and one distrito capital (capital district).

The first three digits of a state's NUTE code determine what NUTE region it lies in. However, the Venezuela NUTE code system has one exceptional case. The state of Apure is partly in two regions. Its municipio of Paez lies in region 506. These are the same as the nine administrative regions established by decree in 1980.

Postal codes:

Venezuela uses four-digit postal codes.

Further subdivisions:

See the Municipalities of Venezuela page.

The states are divided into municipios (municipalities), or, in the case of territories/capital district, into departamentos (departments). The municipios are further subdivided into parroquias (parishes).

Territorial extent:

1. Delta Amacuro includes many islands in the deltas of the Orinoco, Amacuro, and other rivers.
2. Dependencias Federales consists of the Caribbean islands, other than those belonging to Nueva Esparta, between 62� and 68� W. and south of 12�15' N., as well as Isla de las Aves, which is nearer to Guadeloupe. The largest of these islands are La Tortuga, La Blanquilla, and Los Roques.
3. Nueva Esparta consists of Margarita, Cubagua, and Coche islands.
4. Zulia is divided into three parts by Lake Maracaibo. Traveling clockwise around the lake shore from its opening to the sea in the north, you pass through Zulia, Trujillo, Zulia, M�rida, and Zulia.
5. The city of Caracas is divided roughly in half between Distrito Capital and Miranda. It is quite unusual for a city to lie in two different primary administrative divisions of a country.

The UN LOCODE page for Venezuela lists locations in the country, some of them with their latitudes and longitudes, some with their ISO 3166-2 codes for their subdivisions. This information can be put together to approximate the territorial extent of subdivisions.

Origins of names:

1. Amazonas: for the Amazon River
2. Anzo�tegui: Basque for "place of the elder [tree]"; for General Jos� Antonio Anzo�tegui (1789-1819)
3. Apure: for the Apure River
4. Aragua: after the Aragua tribe, whose leader was Chief Maracay; or, Cumanagoto for the chaguaramo, a kind of palm tree
5. Barinas: for the Barinas River
6. Bol�var: for Sim�n Bol�var (1783-1830), independence fighter
7. Carabobo: named for a village, from an ethnic name
8. Caracas: from an ethnic name
9. Cojedes: "nation of potters", from Carib coa: nation, heir: pottery
10. Delta Amacuro: the Amacuro River is a short river within the Orinoco delta
11. Falc�n: for General Juan Cris�stomo Falc�n (1820-1870), president of Venezuela
12. Gu�rico: for the Gu�rico River
13. Lara: for General Jacinto Lara (1777-1859), independence fighter
14. M�rida: after the capital city, which was in turn named after M�rida in Extremadura, Spain
15. Miranda: for Francisco de Miranda (1750-1816), independence fighter
16. Monagas: for Jos� Tadeo Monagas (1784-1868) and Jos� Gregorio Monagas (1795-1858), brothers and presidents of Venezuela
17. Nueva Esparta: Spanish for "New Sparta", to commemorate the inhabitants' heroism in the war for independence
18. Portuguesa: = Portuguese, for the Portuguesa River, supposedly so named because a Portuguese woman drowned in it during the conquista
19. Sucre: for Antonio Jos� de Sucre (1795-1830), South American independence fighter
20. T�chira: for the T�chira River, which was named for tachure, a medicinal plant
21. Trujillo: after the capital city, which was in turn named after Tungala, a former city in C�ceres, Spain
22. Vargas: for Jos� Mar�a Vargas (1786-1854), second president of Venezuela
23. Yaracuy: named for a valorous native chief; the name means "to bring water from far away"
24. Zulia: named for Zulia (1538-1561), a native princess who resisted the conquistadores

Change history:

1. 1777-09-08: The provinces of Cuman� (or Nueva Andaluc�a), Guayana, Maracaibo, Margarita, and Trinidad were detached from the virreinato (viceroyalty) and capitan�a general (captaincy-general) of New Granada, and attached to the captaincy-general of Venezuela (or Caracas). The same region had been made an intendencia in 1776. As a result, Venezuela was unified administratively, militarily, and judicially, with six provinces and Caracas as its capital (source [10]).
2. 1797: Trinidad province (now part of Trinidad and Tobago) taken from Venezuela by the British. The Venzuelan flag of 1797 had four stars, representing four provinces; for that purpose, Margarita was deemed an island and not a province.
3. 1810: Trujillo province split from Maracaibo.
4. 1811-07-05: First Congress of Venezuela declared independence, with representatives of seven provinces present: Barcelona, Barinas, Caracas, Cuman�, Margarita, M�rida, and Trujillo. The provinces of Coro (officially split from Caracas in 1818-07), Guayana, and Maracaibo did not participate.
5. 1817: Guayana province was liberated and became part of Venezuela.
6. 1819-08-15: A new constitution for Venezuela specified a division into the same ten provinces that had existed in 1811.
7. 1819-12-17: Congress of Angostura (now known as Ciudad Bol�var) established the Republic of Colombia (later called Gran Colombia). This entity was initially divided into three departamentos (departments): Cundinamarca (or Santaf�), Quito, and Venezuela. By 1821, they had been replaced by nine departments: Boyac�, Cauca, Cundinamarca, Magdalena, Orinoco (or Orinoco y Matur�n), Panama, Quito, Venezuela, and Zulia (or Maracaibo). In 1821 and 1822 the departments of Apure (split from Venezuela department), Azuay, and Guayaquil were added, and Panama was renamed Istmo. Of these departments, Apure, Orinoco, Venezuela, and Zulia fell mostly within present-day Venezuela. As related to the pre-1819 divisions, Apure department corresponded roughly to Barinas province; Orinoco department to the provinces of Barcelona, Cuman�, Guayana, and Margarita; Venezuela department to Caracas province, and Zulia department to the provinces of Coro, Maracaibo, M�rida, and Trujillo.
8. 1824-06-24: Under Law of Territorial Political Division, Carabobo province split from Caracas.
9. 1830: Rep�blica de Colombia split into three independent countries. Cundinamarca department became Colombia, Quito department became Ecuador, and Venezuela department became Rep�blica de Venezuela. Under the new constitution, the departments disappeared, and Venezuela had eleven provinces.
10. 1831: Trujillo province split from Maracaibo.
11. 1832-03-29: Barquisimeto province split from Carabobo. According to source [11], the populations and areas of the thirteen provinces were as follows.

Notes: Areas in km.� were computed using one league (lg.) = three miles. Guayana area does not include Venezuela's claim to parts of British Guiana and Brazil, amounting to 6,000 lg.�. The atlas also lists population densities of the provinces. The density equals the population divided by the area, rounded down to the next lower tenth of a unit, except in two cases. The density given for Guayana is 2.2 (should be 2.8), and for Carabobo, 145.7 (should be 142.8). I have no explanation for these discrepancies.

The atlas also shows the cantons constituting each province. Capitals of cantons have the same name as the cantons.

1. 1848-02-11: Aragua province split from Caracas with La Victoria as its capital.
2. 1856-04-28: Law of Territorial Division divided Venezuela into 21 provinces: Amazonas, Apure, Aragua, Barcelona, Barinas, Barquisimeto, Carabobo, Caracas, Cojedes, Coro, Cuman�, Gu�rico, Guayana, Maracaibo, Margarita, Maturin, M�rida, Portuguesa, T�chira, Trujillo, and Yaracuy.
3. ~1860: Amazonas province merged with Guayana.
4. 1862: Apure and Barinas provinces merged to form Zamora (reversed in 1864).
5. 1864-03-28: Constitution signed. Estados Unidos de Venezuela designated as the official name of the country. The twenty provinces became "sovereign states" (estados soberanos).
6. ~1864-10: Name of Caracas state changed to Bol�var.
7. ~1864-11: Name of Maracaibo state changed to Zulia.
8. ~1864: Name of Margarita state changed to Nueva Esparta.
9. 1865-06-02: Capital of Bol�var state moved from Petare to Caracas.
10. 1866: Name of Barinas state changed to Zamora.
11. 1871-08-22: Territorio Col�n, equivalent to present Dependencias Federales, created by presidential decree,
12. 1873: Name of Aragua state changed to Guzm�n Blanco.
13. 1874: Name of Coro state changed to Falc�n.
14. 1874: Name of M�rida state changed to Guzm�n.
15. 1881-04-27: New constitution changed all of the old states to secciones (sections), and created nine new states, whose composition was as shown in this table.

1. 1881-08-17: Falc�n and Zulia states merged to form Falc�n-Zulia state, with Casigua as provisional capital, later moved to Capat�rida.
2. 1890-04-01: Falc�n-Zulia state split into Falc�n and Zulia states again.
3. 1891-04-16: Venezuela reorganized under a new constitution. The territorial division was the same as under the 1881 constitution, except that Guzm�n Blanco was now named Miranda, Norte de Occidente became Lara, Oriente became Berm�dez, and Sur de Occidente became Zamora. This constitution also called for the creation of a federal district. It placed the Amazonas and Goagira territories, and certain islands (probably equivalent to modern Dependencias Federales), directly under federal administration.
4. The following table shows the composition of Venezuela in 1891 based on three more contemporary sources: The Columbian Atlas of the World, Garretson, Cox & Co., Buffalo, New York, 1898; The Century Atlas of the World, Benjamin E. Smith, ed., New York, 1906; and Longman's Gazetteer of the World, George G. Chisholm, ed., London, 1920, apparently not revised since its first edition in 1895. These sources present the territories as separate entities, where the constitution considers them as part of various states.

Notes:

1. (1) Longman lists Falcon and Zulia as a single entry. The atlases both spread the name "Falcon" across the territory of both states. The Century Atlas index, on the other hand, says that Falcon and Zulia are both states, and gives a population for each one separately.
2. (2) An alternate name for Ciudad Bolivar was Angostura, Spanish for "narrows".
3. (3) Goajira represents Venezuela's claim to the Guajira Peninsula, now part of Colombia.
4. (4) Graphically, the Century Atlas makes Armisticio, Caura, and Yuruari territories appear to be part of Bolivar state.
5. (5) Longman's Gazetteer says that Yuruari territory was reincorporated with Bolivar state in 1891, but the Century Atlas still displays it and lists it in the index.
6. (6) Population data are from the Century Atlas index. For Armisticio territory, the listing says the population is "included in new divisions"; for Caura territory, "included with the state of Bolivar".
7. (7) When the sum of the individual division populations is compared to the population for Venezuela as a whole, there are 16,910 souls unaccounted for.
8. (8) Most of the area data in the Columbian Atlas and Longman's Gazetteer match. Where they differ, I tried to choose the more plausible figure. The total is much larger than Venezuela's present-day area, but this may be accounted for by border disputes.
9. (9) Both the Columbian and Longman's lump the territories together into a single area figure, which I have arbitrarily listed under Amazonas territory.
10. 1899-04-22: National Congress decreed a return to the twenty states of 1864. This change was embodied in the new constitution, which was adopted on 1901-04-13. The 1901 constitution defined the states to be the same as under the 1864 constitution, with the following names changed: Barinas to Zamora, Barquisimeto to Lara, Caracas to Miranda, Coro to Falc�n, Cuman� to Sucre, Guayana to Bol�var, Maracaibo to Zulia, and Margarita to Nueva Esparta. At the same time, Distrito Federal and the territories of Amazonas, Col�n, Delta Amacuro, and Yuruary were created.
11. 1904-04-27: New constitution adopted, dividing Venezuela into thirteen states (Aragua, Berm�dez, Bol�var, Carabobo, Falc�n, Gu�rico, Lara, M�rida, Miranda, T�chira, Trujillo, Zamora, and Zulia), five territories (Amazonas, Col�n, Crist�bal Col�n, Delta-Amacuro, and Yuruari), and Distrito Federal. The constitution defined each state, and the federal district, by enumerating the distritos that composed it. The federal district included Margarita.
12. 1909-08-05: New constitution adopted. Under it, Venezuela was divided into twenty states, two territories, a federal district, and the federal dependencies. The states were defined by reference to the twenty states under the constitution of 1864, with these changes: Independencia parish was transferred from Maracaibo state to M�rida state, while the remainder of Maracaibo state became Zulia state; Vargas district was transferred from Caracas state to the Distrito Federal, while the remainder of Caracas state became Miranda state; Amazonas and Delta Amacuro territories were split from Guayana state, while the remainder of Guayana state became Bol�var state; and the names of Barcelona, Barinas, Barquisimeto, Coro, Cuman�, Margarita, and Matur�n states were changed to Anzo�tegui, Zamora, Lara, Falc�n, Sucre, Nueva Esparta, and Monagas, respectively.
13. 1917: Border adjustment between Aragua and Carabobo states.
14. 1917-03-12: Capital of Aragua moved from La Victoria to Maracay.
15. These were the divisions at the time of the 1926 census.

1. 1927-02-13: Capital of Miranda moved from Ocumare del Tuy to Los Teques. (Apparently took effect in 1928.)
2. 1928-05-22: New constitution signed. Dependencias Federales created.
3. 1933-12-13: Land around Turiamo transferred from Carabobo to Aragua; several municipios exchanged between Aragua and Gu�rico, amounting to a net gain of 1,414 sq. km. for Aragua.
4. 1934: Capital of Gu�rico moved from Calabozo to San Juan de los Morros.
5. 1937: Name of Zamora changed to Barinas.
6. ~1947: Capital of Portuguesa moved from Acarigua to Guanare.
7. 1948: Under the new constitution, Cubagua island transferred from Dependencias Federales to Nueva Esparta state.
8. 1991-03-08: Status of Delta Amacuro changed from territory to state.
9. 1992-07-23: Status of Amazonas changed from territory to state.
10. 1998-04-22: Vargas territory split from Distrito Federal, consisting of Vargas municipality. The constitutionality of this action was contested; the Supreme Court affirmed it on 1998-05-28.
11. 1998-12-31: Status of Vargas changed from territory to state.
12. 1999-12-30: New Constitution took effect. Name of Distrito Federal changed to Distrito Capital.

Other names of subdivisions:

1. Amazonas: Amazone (French)
2. Anzo�tegui: Barcelona (obsolete)
3. Barinas: Zamora (obsolete)
4. Bol�var: Guayana (obsolete)
5. Dependencias Federales: Dependencias Federales de Alta Mar (formal); Federal Dependencies (variant); Territorio Col�n (obsolete)
6. Distrito Capital: Distrito Federal (obsolete)
7. Falc�n: Coro (obsolete)
8. Lara: Barquisimeto (obsolete)
9. M�rida: Guzm�n (obsolete)
10. Miranda: Caracas (obsolete)
11. Monagas: Matur�n (obsolete)
12. Nueva Esparta: Margarita (obsolete)
13. Sucre: Cuman� (obsolete)
14. Zulia: Maracaibo (obsolete)

Population history:

1990 data adjusted to reflect the split of Vargas from Distrito Capital.

Source [8] has data from earlier censuses. The data agree with the table above, except for 1926 (taken from source [2]), where there are some discrepancies.

Sources:

1. [1] Atlas del Estado Nueva Esparta. Ministerio del Ambiente y de los Recursos Renovables (MARNR), Porlamar, 1994.
2. [2] Enciclopedia Universal Ilustrada Europeo-Americana. Espasa-Calpe, S.A., Madrid, 1958.
3. [3] Chisholm, George G., ed., Longman's Gazetteer of the World. Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1920 (apparently not revised since the 1895 first edition).
4. [4] Anuario Estad�stico de Venezuela 1991. Oficina Central de Estad�stica e Inform�tica, Caracas, 1992.
5. [5] Venezuela: Divisi�n Politico-Territorial 1978. Oficina Central de Estad�stica e Inform�tica, Caracas, 1978.
6. [6] Venezuela's constitutions , Miguel de Cervantes Virtual Library (retrieved 2005-06-09).
7. [7] "As� va el Censo" has preliminary 2001 census figures for the states (http://www.ine.gov.ve/ine/censo/boletines/asi\_va\_el\_censo09.pdf, dead link, retrieved 2004-01-31). Note: the PDF document gives 22,688,803 as the total population of Venezuela, but the state-by-state populations add up to 22,689,935. The difference between these two numbers is 1,132, which happens to be the population of Dependencias Federales. Does this mean that the people of Dependencias Federales are not part of Venezuela? Anyway, I included them in my total for the 2001 population of Venezuela.
8. [8] Instituto de Investigaciones Econ�micas y Sociales has (presumably proleptic) census populations by states from 1873 to 1990 (retrieved 2005-06-09).
9. [9] Metes and bounds of Vargas territory were given at http://www.terra.com.ve/especiales/vargas/vistazo/gaceta36464.htm (dead link, retrieved 2003-09-08), and before that at http://www.estadovargas.com/Gaceta1.html (dead link, retrieved 2001-02-06).
10. [10] "Integraci�n de las provincias", with maps (retrieved 2005-06-09).
11. [11] Codazzi, Agustin, Atlas fisico y politico de la Republica de Venezuela , 1840 (retrieved 2005-06-09).
12. [12] Library of Congress country study (retrieved 1999).
13. [13] Censo 2011 Redatam (retrieved 2015-01-07). This page has a copyright notice for the Venezuelan Instituto Nacional de Estad�stica, but is driven by REDATAM (REcuperaci�n de DATos para �reas peque�as por Microcomputador: Data recovery for small areas by microcomputer), a Latin American and Caribbean consortium.