Cardozo, Efraím (1906–1973)

Efraím Cardozo (b. 16 October 1906; d. 10 April 1973), Paraguayan diplomat and historian. Born in Villarrica, Efraím Cardozo was the son of noted educator and journalist Ramón I. Cardozo and Juana Sosa. Given his parents' interest in the study of history, it is little wonder that Cardozo became a professional historian, one of Paraguay's best. He received a doctorate in law and social sciences at the National University of Asunción in 1932, and set off immediately on a diplomatic career, participating in the cease-fire negotiations that ended the Chaco War (1932–1935) and in the 1938 signing of the final peace treaty with Bolivia.

Cardozo was a Liberal, and on several occasions, officially (1970–1972) as well as unofficially, was president of the Liberal Radical Party. His political affiliations brought him considerable hardships during the Higinio Morínigo dictatorship (1940–1948), including exile to Argentina on eight occasions. He later served in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Senate, while simultaneously working as a professor at the National University and the Catholic University in Asunción.

Cardozo is best remembered for his many historical studies, which were scrupulously researched and which betrayed none of the partisan fanaticism so common in Paraguayan historiography. His thoroughly documented El imperio del Brasil y el Río de la Plata: Antecedentes y estallido de la guerra del Paraguay (1961) won the Alberdi-Sarmiento Prize for its incisive analysis of South American diplomacy prior to the War of the Triple Alliance (1864–1870). His other publications include Paraguay independiente (1949), Vísperas de la guerra del Paraguay (1954), El Paraguay colonial: Las raíces de la nacionalidad (1959), Historiografía paraguaya (1959), and Hace cien años: Crónicas de la guerra 1864–1870 (13 vols., 1967–1976).

See alsoParaguay: The Twentieth Centuryxml .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Dennis Joseph Vodarsik, "Efraím Cardozo (1906–1973)," in Hispanic American Historical Review 54, no. 1 (1974): 116.

Jack Ray Thomas, Biographical Dictionary of Latin American Historians and Historiography (1984).

Efraím Cardozo, Paraguay independiente (Asunción, 1987).

                         Marta FernÁndez Whigham