| Honorific-Prefix: | The Most Excellent | ||||||||||
| Birth Name: | Rafael María Baralt y Pérez | ||||||||||
| Birth Date: | 3 July 1810 | ||||||||||
| Birth Place: | Maracaibo, Viceroyalty of New Granada | ||||||||||
| Death Place: | Madrid, Spain | ||||||||||
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Rafael María Baralt y Pérez (3 July 1810 - 4 January 1860) was a Venezuelan diplomat and one of the country's most famed writers, philologists, and historians. He was the first Latin American to occupy a chair at the Real Academia Española.
Born in Maracaibo on 3 July 1810, he was the son of Miguel Antonio Baralt, who helped build the Baralt Theater in Maracaibo, and Ana Francisca Pérez, who was Dominican.
Baralt was elected to seat R of the Real Academia Española, he took up his seat on 27 November 1853.[1]
He suffered an untimely death in Madrid on 4 January 1860 due to the stresses and aggravations suffered during services rendered to his beloved country of birth. He is buried in the National Pantheon of Venezuela.