Italian Chileans

As a major seaport, Valparaíso received immigrants from many European countries, mainly from Britain, Germany, France, Switzerland and Italy.

Other national ethnic groups represented are German, English, Italian, Swiss and Irish.

Settlers arrived from the northern Italian region of Emilia Romagna (Bologna and major cities such as Modena) and left a generation of Italo-Chilean that lasts to this day, which has contributed to enriching the local culture.

This is because Swiss linguistic and cultural characteristics are commonly confused with those of Germans, Italians and French.

French and Italian families established agriculture, including the important wine industry: the Wine Route is one of the main tourist attractions of the Colchagua valley.

The club's traditional rivals are Palestino, a team founded by members of the Palestinian diaspora living in Chile and Audax Italiano, which originated from their local Italian counterpart.

(See also "Italian Peruvians", "Italian Chileans", "Italian Uruguayans").

This is because their linguistic and cultural characteristics are commonly confused with Germans, Italians and French.

Italians also immigrated in vast numbers to South America, mainly to Brazil (see Italian Brazilian), Argentina (an estimated one-third to half of Argentines are of Italian descent, with some higher estimates putting Italian Argentines at 60% of the population (see also Italian Argentine), Uruguay (Italian Uruguayans constitute an estimated 40% of the population of Uruguay. See Italian Uruguayans), Chile (see Italian Chilean), Venezuela (see Italo-Venezuelans), and Paraguay (30% of the population of Paraguay, see Italians in Paraguay), although Italians also arrived in notable numbers elsewhere in Latin America (i.e. Colombia (Italian Colombians), Mexico (Italian-Mexicans), Panama, Puerto Rico (see Corsican immigration to Puerto Rico), Costa Rica (Italian Costa Ricans), Cuba (Italian Cubans), Peru (Italian Peruvians), Guatemala (Italian Guatemalans), and Haiti (Italian Haitians). In contrast to the Italian immigrants to North America, a slight but significant majority of Italian immigrants to South America were Northern Italians from Veneto and other depressed Northern Italian areas, though Southern Italians from areas such as Sicily, Campania, and Calabria still constituted a significant percentage of Italian immigrants to South America, and later Italian immigration to South America from World War II to the 2000s has consisted mostly of Southern Italians.

Italian immigrants contributed pasta and meat products, and in towns like Capitán Pastene in the south of Chile, they still prepare Prosciutto in the same way as the first Italian immigrants.