The General Artigas Fortress, popularly known as Fortaleza del Cerro, is located in the city of Montevideo (Uruguay).
In a dominant position on the highest hill in the department of Montevideo (popularly known as El Cerro, (Cerro de Montevideo) with its altitude of 134 meters above the sea level, on the opposite side of the bay. This is the last Spanish fortification built in Uruguay.
From 1680, with the first settlement of the Colonia del Sacramento by Portuguese troops from the Captaincy of Rio de Janeiro, a dispute began for the position of the left bank of the Rio de la Plata, breaching the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) . After military and diplomatic military and diplomatic visits, both Portuguese and Spanish crowns led by Manuel de Freitas da Fonseca had the intention of establishing a port in the Bay of Montevideo in 1723. In response, an expedition Of Buenos Aires, organized by the Governor and Captain General of the Rio de la Plata, Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, expelled these troops the following year, destroying the Portuguese establishment. Foreseeing future incursions of the Portuguese of this type, began the Spanish settlement of the place, initially with six families from Buenos Aires, to which would be added other families, brought from the Canary Islands. The city was thus founded on December 24, 1726, calling itself San Felipe and Santiago de Montevideo, becoming the main port of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata.