The "Liberator" of South America, who freed six nations
The central leader of South America’s independence movement, honored as "the Liberator" (El Libertador). In the early nineteenth century he led armies over the Andes and across thousands of miles, freeing Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia in turn from three centuries of Spanish colonial rule — Bolivia is named directly for him. He dreamed of uniting all of Spanish America into one great republic, but it collapsed amid division and infighting, and in his last years he lamented in despair that "revolutionaries plow the sea." He is the Washington of Latin America, and the embodiment of its idealism and its fate of fragmentation.
Bolívar freed half of South America, then watched his dream of a united great republic split apart, its regions falling into warlord strife. In his last years he wrote in despair: "He who serves a revolution plows the sea." A man who had freed six nations could not make them unite — that bitter line captures the powerlessness of the idealist before the reality of politics.
Below are how modern works borrow or reinterpret this name or story — not the original material. The two differ, so keep them apart.