In 2010, numerous countries in Latin America celebrated two hundred years of independence from Spain. On the occasion of this “Bicentenario“, the Institute for Latin American Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin and the German Historical Museum in Berlin organized an international conference to address the question of independence as a reference point for national memory in the social consciousness, public sphere and historiography of Latin America. This volume of conference proceedings, with contributions by historians from Latin America, England, and Germany, discusses these questions with regard to the regional diversity of Latin America.