San Luis Potosi, Mexico

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increasing modernisation, the town with its beautiful old buildings and parks has preserved much of the character of the colonial period.

History

Little is known of the town's pre-Spanish history. Tanjamanja, a settlement founded by the Cuachichil Indians, was once supposed to have been situated here.

The first Spaniards, led initially by Miguel Caldera and soon after by Franciscan friars, arrived in the area between 1585 and 1590. At the same time considerable quantities of silver and gold were discovered, and the settlement of Real de Minas de San Luis Potosí was founded, taking the name Potosí (Quechua: "place of great wealth") from the silver town of the same name in Bolivia. In 1658 the settlement received its municipal charter from Philipp IV. Until 1824 San Luis Potosí was the principal town of an extensive intendencia, to which Texas also belonged. During the French War of Intervention (1862-66) and for a short time afterwards San Luis Potosí served as the seat of Benito Juárez's government which had been expelled from Mexico City.