Venezuelan War of Independence
The establishment of the Supreme Caracas Junta following the forced deposition of Vicente Emparan as Captain General of the Captaincy General of Venezuela on April 19, 1810, marked the beginnings of the war. On July 5, 1811, seven of the ten provinces of the Captaincy General of Venezuela declared their independence in the Venezuelan Declaration of Independence. The First Republic of Venezuela was lost in 1812 following the 1812 Caracas earthquake and the Battle of La Victoria (1812). Simón Bolívar led an "Admirable Campaign" to retake Venezuela, establishing the Second Republic of Venezuela in 1813; but this too did not last, falling to a combination of a local uprising and Spanish royalist reconquest. Only as part of Bolívar's campaign to liberate New Granada in 1819-20 did Venezuela achieve a lasting independence from Spain (initially as part of Gran Colombia).
Congress of Angostura
The Congress of Angostura is considered Venezuela's second legislative congress, the first being the one that met in 1811. Its culminating piece of legislation was the Venezuelan Constitution of 1819, officially adopted on August 15, but quickly made obsolete by the creation of the Republic of Colombia on December 17, 1819. This new nation joined Venezuela, New Granada and Quito (today Ecuador). In order to differentiate it from the present Republic of Colombia, historians have traditionally called the nation Gran Colombia. A constitution for the new nation was created at the Congress of Cúcuta in August 1821.