Digitale Ausgabe
Download
| TEI-XML (Ansicht) | |
| Text (Ansicht) | |
| Text normalisiert (Ansicht) |
Ansicht
| Textgröße | |
| Originalzeilenfall ein/aus | |
| Zeichen original/normiert | |
Zitierempfehlung
Alexander von Humboldt: „Earthquake in the Caraccas“, in: ders., Sämtliche Schriften digital, herausgegeben von Oliver Lubrich und Thomas Nehrlich, Universität Bern 2021. URL: <https://humboldt.unibe.ch/text/1819-Baron_Humboldts_Personal_Heft1-14-neu> [abgerufen am 19.04.2024].
URL und Versionierung
|
Permalink: https://humboldt.unibe.ch/text/1819-Baron_Humboldts_Personal_Heft1-14-neu |
| Die Versionsgeschichte zu diesem Text finden Sie auf github. |
| Titel | Earthquake in the Caraccas | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jahr | 1820 | ||||||
| Ort | London | ||||||
|
Nachweis in: The Annual Register, or a View of the History, Politics, and Literature, for the Year 1819 (1820), S. 551–553.
|
|||||||
| Sprache | Englisch | ||||||
| Typografischer Befund | Antiqua; Spaltensatz; Auszeichnung: Kursivierung. | ||||||
|
Identifikation |
|||||||
Statistiken
|
|||||||
|551|
|Spaltenumbruch|
(Humboldt’s Travels.)
THE shock felt at Caraccas, inthe month of December, 1811,was the only one, that precededthe horrible catastrophe of the26th of March, 1812. The in-habitants of Terra Firma wereignorant of the agitations of thevolcano in the island of St. Vin-cent on one side, and on theother, of those that were felt inthe basin of the Mississippi,where, on the 7th and 8th of Fe-bruary, 1812, the earth was dayand night in perpetual oscilla-tion. A great drought prevailedat this period in the province ofVenezuela. Not a single dropof rain had fallen at Caraccas, orin the country ninety leaguesround, during the five monthswhich preceded the destructionof the capital. The 26th ofMarch was a remarkably hot day.The air was calm, and the skyunclouded. It was Holy Thurs-day, and a great part of the po-pulation was assembled in thechurches. Nothing seemed topresage the calamities of theday. At seven minutes afterfour in the afternoon the firstshock was felt; it was sufficiently
|Spaltenumbruch|powerful, to make the bells ofthe churches toll; it lasted fiveor six seconds, during whichtime, the ground was in a conti-nual undulating movement, andseemed to heave up like a boilingliquid. The danger was thoughtto be past, when a tremendoussubterraneous noise was heard,resembling the rolling of thunder,but louder, and of longer conti-nuance, than that heard withinthe tropics in time of storms.This noise preceded a perpendi-cular motion of three or fourseconds, followed by an undula-tory movement somewhat longer.The shocks were in opposite di-rections, from north to south,and from east to west. Nothingcould resist the movement frombeneath upward, and undulationscrossing each other. The townof Caraccas was entirely over-thrown. Thousands of the inha-bitants (between nine and tenthousand) were buried under theruins of the houses and churches.The procession had not yet setout; but the crowd was so greatin the churches, that nearly threeor four thousand persons werecrushed by the fall of theirvaulted roofs. The explosionwas stronger toward the north, in
|552|
|Spaltenumbruch|that part of the town situatenearest the mountain of Avila,and the Silla. The churches ofla Trinidad and Alta Gracia,which were more than one hun-dred and fifty feet high, and thenaves of which were supportedby pillars of twelve or fifteenfeet diameter, left a mass ofruins scarcely exceeding five orsix feet in elevation. The sink-ing of the ruins has been so con-siderable, that there now scarcelyremain any vestiges of pillars orcolumns. The barracks, called
El Quartel de San Carlos, situatefarther north of the church ofthe Trinity, on the road from theCustom-house de la Pastora,almost entirely disappeared. Aregiment of troops of the line,that was assembled under arms,ready to join the procession,was, with the exception of a fewmen, buried under the ruins ofthis great edifice. Nine tenthsof the fine town of Caraccaswere entirely destroyed. Thewalls of the houses that were notthrown down, as those of thestreet San Juan, near the Ca-puchin hospital, were crackedin such a manner, that it was im-possible to run the risk of inha-biting them. The effects of theearthquake were somewhat lessviolent in the western and south-ern parts of the city, betweenthe principal square and the ravinof Caraguata. There, the ca-thedral, supported by enormousbuttresses, remains standing.
Estimating at nine or ten thou-sand the number of the dead inthe city of Caraccas, we do notinclude those unhappy persons,who, dangerously wounded, pe-rished several months after, for
|Spaltenumbruch|want of food and proper care.The night of Holy Thursdaypresented the most distressingscene of desolation and sorrow.That thick cloud of dust, which,rising above the ruins, darkenedthe sky like a fog, had settled onthe ground. No shock was felt,and never was a night morecalm, or more serene. The moon,nearly full, illumined the roundeddomes of the Silla, and theaspect of the sky formed a per-fect contrast to that of the earth,covered with the dead, andheaped with ruins. Mothers wereseen bearing in their arms theirchildren, whom they hoped torecall to life. Desolate familieswandered through the city, seek-ing a brother, a husband, a friend,of whose fate they were ignorant,and whom they believed to belost in the crowd. The peoplepressed along the streets, whichcould no more be recognizedbut by long lines of ruins.
All the calamities experiencedin the great catastrophes of Lis-bon, Messina, Lima, and Rio-bamba were renewed on the fatalday of the 26th of March, 1812.“The wounded, buried under theruins, implored by their cries thehelp of the passers by, and nearlytwo thousand were dug out.Never was pity displayed in amore affecting manner; neverhad it been seen more ingeni-ously active, than in the effortsemployed to save the miserablevictims, whose groans reachedthe ear. Implements for digging,and clearing away the ruins wereentirely wanting; and the peoplewere obliged to use their barehands, to disinter the living. Thewounded, as well as the sick who
|553|
|Spaltenumbruch|had escaped from the hospitals,were laid on the banks of thesmall river Guayra. They foundno shelter but the foliage oftrees. Beds, linen to dress thewounds, instruments of surgery,medicines, and objects of themost urgent necessity, were bu-ried under the ruins. Everything, even food, was wantingduring the first days. Waterbecame alike scarce in the inte-rior of the city. The commotionhad rent the pipes of the foun-tains; the falling in of the earthhad choaked up the springs thatsupplied them; and it becamenecessary, in order to have wa-ter, to go down to the riverGuayra, which was considerablyswelled; and then vessels toconvey the water were wanting.
There remained a duty tobe fulfilled toward the dead, en-joined at once by piety, and thedread of infection. It being im-possible to inter so many thou-sand corpses, half-buried underthe ruins, commissaries were ap-pointed to burn the bodies: andfor this purpose funeral piles wereerected between the heaps ofruins. This ceremony lastedseveral days. Amid so manypublic calamities, the people de-voted themselves to those reli-gious duties, which they thoughtwere the most fitted to appeasethe wrath of heaven. Some, as-sembling in processions, sungfuneral hymns; others, in a stateof distraction, confessed them-selves aloud in the streets. Inthis town was now repeated whathad been remarked in the pro-vince of Quito, after the tre-mendous earthquake of 1797; anumber of marriages were con-
|Spaltenumbruch|tracted between persons, whohad neglected for many years tosanction their union by the sa-cerdotal benediction. Childrenfound parents, by whom they hadnever till then been acknow-ledged; restitutions were pro-mised by persons, who had neverbeen accused of fraud; and fa-milies, who had long been ene-mies, were drawn together bythe tie of common calamity.” Ifthis feeling seemed to calm thepassions of some, and open theheart to pity, it had a contraryeffect on others, rendering themmore rigid and inhuman. Ingreat calamities vulgar mindspreserve still less goodness thanstrength: misfortune acts in thesame manner, as the pursuits ofliterature and the study of na-ture; their happy influence isfelt only by a few, giving moreardour to sentiment, more eleva-tion to the thoughts, and morebenevolence to the disposition.
|Spaltenumbruch|
EARTHQUAKE IN THE CARACCAS.