A
caudillo (;
Old Spanish:
cabdillo, from
Latin capitellum, diminutive of
caput "head") was a
military-
landowner that possessed political power and exercised it in a form considered
authoritarian by detractors. The term can be translated into English as
leader or
chief, or more pejoratively as
warlord,
dictator or
strongman and has been used to refer to charismatic populist leaders.
Caudillos were very influential in the history of
Hispanic America and have a legacy that has influenced political movements in the modern day. The term originally described leaders possessing military power, such as
Indibilis and Mandonius,
Viriathus,
Almanzor (sometimes in the modern historiography),
Don Pelayo and other fighters of the
Reconquista, and others such as
Simón Bolivar,
Francisco Franco and
Juan Perón. In Hispanic America, another sense developed of the
caudillo as a
demagogic lawyer and politician, with the populist
Jorge Eliécer Gaitán having been honored with the title "Caudillo of The Colombian People". Other uses of the term referred to leaders without state responsibilities like
cacique in Spain and those wielding
oligarchical–
plutocratic power.