December 23, 1863, a twenty-two years is aimed at the Consulate of Spain in Beirut, a city which come two months later. To understand the presence of this 
English diplomat in East must take account of English foreign policy in the nineteenth century, a century especially bad for us as it starts with the invasion of Napoleon's troops in 1808, a moment of weakness that is exploited by the American colonies to emancipate themselves from the metropolis. Spain lost its empire overseas and also faces a civil war between liberals and conservatives in 1833 by the succession of Ferdinand VII, winning the favor of her daughter, Elizabeth II, which represents the triumph of liberalism in 1839. So, protected by the Liberal Europe seeks to achieve the output range, participating in the Crimean War, 1853-55, as observers in the coalition of support to the Ottomans, or in conjunction with the French in the expedition to Cochin in 1858, which ended with the capture of Saigon and Indochina Gallic control ten years later. While the expedition was successful thanks to tanned troops in the Philippines, Spain failed to expand their territories. However, the morale of the political and military was quite high and a year later conquer Tangier and Tetuan in Morocco, thus achieving the scramble into Africa, a continent that fought in France, Great Britain, Holland, Belgium , Portugal and Italy.
back the Ottoman Empire, the events of the summer of 1860, which produces a riot between Christians and Druze in the Lebanese mountain, spreading to the Bekaa, reaching
produces Damascus of the first European intervention, sending its fleet to Napoleon III pacify the region, with the passivity of the Ottoman authorities. International public opinion paid great attention to the riots at European representations attacks occur and religious institutions. One of these was the English Franciscan convent in Damascus, whose occupants, seven English, Austrian and three Lebanese were killed. English media continued the conflict, published also several letters from the Algerian Abdel Kader, a hero and protector of the Christians of Damascus. In Spain you were given a compensation of more than two million piastres, which rebuilt the convent, which were collected through the Consulate in Beirut. It is at this time from Madrid is decided to open a vice in Damascus, thus extending the English network of offices that had a legation to Sublime Porte and a presence in Beirut, Jerusalem, Cairo and Smyrna.
This is the historical context of Adolfo de Rivadenyra as part of the Eastern Question, where liberal Europe will withdraw its support to the Turks, leaving Russia with the help of the Balkans become independent in 1878, Cyprus pass under British control, lost colonies in North Africa in the late nineteenth century and the Arab provinces after First World War.
The second target of this diplomat was Ceylon, an island that had a certain importance to English interests, being a focal point between communications between Europe, the Far East and Oceania, especially after the opening of the Suez Canal in November 1869. Colombo was one of the first stops that made the vapors passing the Red Sea to the Arabian Sea. From there you could go to the British possessions in India, to Batavia, the capital of the Dutch East Indies in Indonesia, continue the trip to Indochina, Hong Kong, free ports of China or enter the Pacific Ocean heading for the Philippines Japan, Australia or America. Do not forget that Spain had important territories in the Asia Pacific region until the late nineteenth century, not only the Philippines, won in the second half of the sixteenth century, but other islands as the Carolinas, the Marianas and the Palau.
Rivadenyera Adolfo was born in Valparaiso in 1841. His father, one of the editors
important nineteenth-century author of the Bibliography of English writers, that his son will end, he had traveled to Chile to carry out a publishing venture in the newspaper industry, participating in founded the newspaper El Mercurio. In fact, it was in Chile where he met his wife, Nieves Sanchez, and gave birth to her first child. Seven years later the family returned to Spain. Adolfo studied in Germany, France, Belgium and England, mastered five languages \u200b\u200balive and Latin. Later learned Arabic and Persian. His diplomatic career began in 1863 as Young Languages \u200b\u200bbound the eastern Mediterranean, covering destinations in 1864-1867 Beirut, Jerusalem, Damascus Ceylon in 1868, 1869-1870, 1874-75 and Mogador Persia in 1878 where it will be just under a year back to Madrid where he died in February 1882, at age forty.
Like many others he combined representation of national interests with writing books of travel literature. This author has given us two books: Journey of Ceylon Damascus and
Travel within Persia. The first was born in Madrid in 1871 and has been reissued on three occasions. The first in Santiago de Chile 1949, by Ramon de la Serna to subscribers of the Southern Cross editorial in two volumes entitled Courier Baghdad. From Iraq to Syria for the classic route of the Merchants . The second edition appeared in 1988 in Barcelona Laertes editorial with an introduction by Lily Litvak and 2006 in Madrid in Miraguano, by Fernando Martín Escribano. Adolfo
Rivadeneyra has clear and simple style, which departs from the romantic travelers
as Chateaubriand, Lord Byron, Lamartine, Nerval and Gautier, who had made the eastern Mediterranean a fantastic space, a product more of their dreams than reality. That is why Rivadeneyra makes clear what your intention when writing his memoirs: "We are so few English we left Europe, as we know from distant lands to read it in books written by foreigners, and almost always French whose works, incidentally, do not shine for accurate and portray the character too impressed with its authors. "
Keep in mind that when Rivadenyra writes his books the romance was in its death throes and had to tire the reader in his search for exotic locales, beauty or freedom inhospitable nature, meditations on the ruins, adventures and romances impossible. Realistic literature had been making a hole with Russian authors like Tolstoy, Dickens in England, Zola in France and Galdos in Spain. New vision was needed to conform to reality, in which the author left aside its sensitivity and subjectivity to convey what he saw. That is what made Adolfo de Rivadenyera.
English diplomat in East must take account of English foreign policy in the nineteenth century, a century especially bad for us as it starts with the invasion of Napoleon's troops in 1808, a moment of weakness that is exploited by the American colonies to emancipate themselves from the metropolis. Spain lost its empire overseas and also faces a civil war between liberals and conservatives in 1833 by the succession of Ferdinand VII, winning the favor of her daughter, Elizabeth II, which represents the triumph of liberalism in 1839. So, protected by the Liberal Europe seeks to achieve the output range, participating in the Crimean War, 1853-55, as observers in the coalition of support to the Ottomans, or in conjunction with the French in the expedition to Cochin in 1858, which ended with the capture of Saigon and Indochina Gallic control ten years later. While the expedition was successful thanks to tanned troops in the Philippines, Spain failed to expand their territories. However, the morale of the political and military was quite high and a year later conquer Tangier and Tetuan in Morocco, thus achieving the scramble into Africa, a continent that fought in France, Great Britain, Holland, Belgium , Portugal and Italy. back the Ottoman Empire, the events of the summer of 1860, which produces a riot between Christians and Druze in the Lebanese mountain, spreading to the Bekaa, reaching
produces Damascus of the first European intervention, sending its fleet to Napoleon III pacify the region, with the passivity of the Ottoman authorities. International public opinion paid great attention to the riots at European representations attacks occur and religious institutions. One of these was the English Franciscan convent in Damascus, whose occupants, seven English, Austrian and three Lebanese were killed. English media continued the conflict, published also several letters from the Algerian Abdel Kader, a hero and protector of the Christians of Damascus. In Spain you were given a compensation of more than two million piastres, which rebuilt the convent, which were collected through the Consulate in Beirut. It is at this time from Madrid is decided to open a vice in Damascus, thus extending the English network of offices that had a legation to Sublime Porte and a presence in Beirut, Jerusalem, Cairo and Smyrna. 
This is the historical context of Adolfo de Rivadenyra as part of the Eastern Question, where liberal Europe will withdraw its support to the Turks, leaving Russia with the help of the Balkans become independent in 1878, Cyprus pass under British control, lost colonies in North Africa in the late nineteenth century and the Arab provinces after First World War. The second target of this diplomat was Ceylon, an island that had a certain importance to English interests, being a focal point between communications between Europe, the Far East and Oceania, especially after the opening of the Suez Canal in November 1869. Colombo was one of the first stops that made the vapors passing the Red Sea to the Arabian Sea. From there you could go to the British possessions in India, to Batavia, the capital of the Dutch East Indies in Indonesia, continue the trip to Indochina, Hong Kong, free ports of China or enter the Pacific Ocean heading for the Philippines Japan, Australia or America. Do not forget that Spain had important territories in the Asia Pacific region until the late nineteenth century, not only the Philippines, won in the second half of the sixteenth century, but other islands as the Carolinas, the Marianas and the Palau.
Rivadenyera Adolfo was born in Valparaiso in 1841. His father, one of the editors
important nineteenth-century author of the Bibliography of English writers, that his son will end, he had traveled to Chile to carry out a publishing venture in the newspaper industry, participating in founded the newspaper El Mercurio. In fact, it was in Chile where he met his wife, Nieves Sanchez, and gave birth to her first child. Seven years later the family returned to Spain. Adolfo studied in Germany, France, Belgium and England, mastered five languages \u200b\u200balive and Latin. Later learned Arabic and Persian. His diplomatic career began in 1863 as Young Languages \u200b\u200bbound the eastern Mediterranean, covering destinations in 1864-1867 Beirut, Jerusalem, Damascus Ceylon in 1868, 1869-1870, 1874-75 and Mogador Persia in 1878 where it will be just under a year back to Madrid where he died in February 1882, at age forty. Like many others he combined representation of national interests with writing books of travel literature. This author has given us two books: Journey of Ceylon Damascus and
Travel within Persia. The first was born in Madrid in 1871 and has been reissued on three occasions. The first in Santiago de Chile 1949, by Ramon de la Serna to subscribers of the Southern Cross editorial in two volumes entitled Courier Baghdad. From Iraq to Syria for the classic route of the Merchants . The second edition appeared in 1988 in Barcelona Laertes editorial with an introduction by Lily Litvak and 2006 in Madrid in Miraguano, by Fernando Martín Escribano. Adolfo Rivadeneyra has clear and simple style, which departs from the romantic travelers
as Chateaubriand, Lord Byron, Lamartine, Nerval and Gautier, who had made the eastern Mediterranean a fantastic space, a product more of their dreams than reality. That is why Rivadeneyra makes clear what your intention when writing his memoirs: "We are so few English we left Europe, as we know from distant lands to read it in books written by foreigners, and almost always French whose works, incidentally, do not shine for accurate and portray the character too impressed with its authors. "Keep in mind that when Rivadenyra writes his books the romance was in its death throes and had to tire the reader in his search for exotic locales, beauty or freedom inhospitable nature, meditations on the ruins, adventures and romances impossible. Realistic literature had been making a hole with Russian authors like Tolstoy, Dickens in England, Zola in France and Galdos in Spain. New vision was needed to conform to reality, in which the author left aside its sensitivity and subjectivity to convey what he saw. That is what made Adolfo de Rivadenyera.
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