Huaral

Huaral is a city in the Lima Department of Peru and the capital of Huaral Province, in the Chancay Valley on the central coast, 80 kilometres north of Lima. It is called the Agricultural Capital and Lima's Pantry because of the produce of the surrounding valleys. Two explanations are given for the name: the historian Jesus Elias Ipinze derives it from the cacique Martín Guaral Paico of the mid sixteenth century, while the archaeologist Julio C. Tello derives it from Aymara words such as huaralí. The Spanish founded the settlement on 21 March 1551 under Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza, as the Settlement of the Indies. It was first an annex of Chancay, and the creation of San Juan de Huaral was decreed on 31 October 1890 by President Remigio Morales Bermúdez, with the first municipality installed on 1 April 1893. Since the 1960s settlers from the interior have arrived, forming young towns on its edges.