Coahuila de Zaragoza

Mexican State

Area: 150,395sq.km/58,052sq.mi

Population: 2,173,800

Coahuila, Mexico's third largest state after Chihuahua and Sonora, shares its borders with the USA (Texas) to the north, Chihuahua and Durango to the west, Zacatecas to the south and Nuevo León to the east. It consists mainly of a vast uneven plateau crossed by several mountain chains. The climate is predominantly hot and dry and the soil infertile, except in those valleys which are artificially irrigated (at considerable cost).

History Álvaro Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, the first European to reach the area - at the time inhabitated mainly by nomadic tribes - did so after an eight year trek on foot. The first reasonably-sized settlement in Coahuila (Náhuatl: "featherless serpent"), was established in 1575 by Francisco de Urdiñola on the site of present-day Saltillo. To provide protection against hostile Indians, Urdiñola brought some of Spain's Mexican allies the Tlaxcaltecs with him. Unlike other tribes they were accorded substantial privileges. From this initial outpost the Spaniards slowly pressed further north into what is now the USA.

From Mexican Independence until the hiving off of the Texan territories in 1836, Coahuila and Texas formed a single state, with Monclova or Saltillo as its capital. At that time, and also subsequently, unrest verging on civil war brought the Mexicans under General Antonio López de Santa Ana into conflict with Americans led by Zachary Taylor, culminating eventually in outright war against the United States. In 1857 Coahuila was amalgamated with Nuevo León, only becoming an independent state in 1868. In 1863 Benito Juárez, fleeing from French Interventionist troops, temporarily set up his headquarters in Saltillo.

The state, blessed with good transport links, boasts a relatively stable economy based principally on steel production, a substantial mining industry (silver, lead, coal, copper, iron), an increasingly important agricultural processing industry, and many branches of agriculture as such including cultivation of maize, wheat, beans, cotton and sugar cane. Livestock farming also contributes significantly.