The unrest began with a seemingly trivial incident—a Spanish merchant's refusal to lend a flower vase to a Creole for a dinner honoring a visiting official—that erupted into a full riot against Spanish authority. Crowds forced the creation of an autonomous governing junta that day, a pivotal step toward independence from Spain, formally achieved years later. Colombia now celebrates July 20 as its Independence Day.
The spark was almost absurdly small. José González Llorente, a Spanish shopkeeper in Santa Fe de Bogotá, refused a request from Creole patriot Antonio Morales to borrow a decorative vase for a banquet honoring Antonio Villavicencio, a commissioner newly arrived from Spain. Words turned to insults, insults to a scuffle, and within hours the incident—almost certainly engineered by independence-minded Creoles looking for a pretext—had drawn a furious crowd into the streets.
By the afternoon of July 20, 1810, the crowd's anger had outgrown the vase entirely. Demonstrators demanded the removal of the Spanish viceroy and the formation of a local governing council. Under pressure, colonial authorities agreed to establish a junta that nominally still recognized the deposed Spanish king Ferdinand VII but in practice began asserting home rule.
The junta's creation didn't deliver instant independence—Spain would fight to reclaim the territory, and full sovereignty wasn't secured until Simón Bolívar's military campaigns culminated in victory at the Battle of Boyacá in 1819. But Colombians trace their nation's birth to this day, still known as El Grito de Independencia, the Cry of Independence, and celebrated annually with parades and fireworks across the country.