ECUADOR, 2015, for the 400th anniversary of his birth, in a set honoring the anniversaries of five illustrious Ecuadorians.

Antonio Bastidas was born in Guayaquil born in 1615.  His life was dedicated to letters, teaching, and, above all, to the Gospel, until death overtook him in Bogotá, December 1, 1681.  At a young age he went to Quito to study at the College of San Luis, and he entered the Society of Jesus on May 14, 1632.  After the usual course of studies and ordination he taught Grammar at the Jesuit College of Cuenca for three years.   He later taught grammar and humanities and rhetoric, which included Latin and metrics, at the College of San Luis de Quito. Between 1568 and 1578 he taught and preached at the Jesuit College of Popayan.  His poetical works were written in the style of Luis de Góngora y Argote who wanted to form a cultural, poetic vocabulary to replace the prosaic, conceptual words and phrases worn out by years of use.  Bastidas appears in the historical chronology of Ecuadorian poetry as the first colonial poet.