Guanajuato << gwah nah HWAH toh, >> is a state in central Mexico. It covers 11,773 square miles (30,491 square kilometers). At the time of the 2020 census, Guanajuato had a population of 6,166,934. The Sierra Madre Oriental mountain range rises in the northern part of the state. A fertile lowland region known as the bajio covers southern Guanajuato. The city of Guanajuato is the capital.
Since the 1500’s, Guanajuato has been an important center for mining silver. The bajio region is one of Mexico’s leading producers of cereal grains. Since the early 1900’s, the state has undergone an industrial transformation. Leon, Guanajuato’s largest city, is an important industrial center. Tourism is another important economic activity, particularly in the city of Guanajuato. The capital contains beautiful buildings from the colonial period.
The Tarascan Indians were among the native peoples of what is now Guanajuato. The name Guanajuato comes from the Tarascan name Quanashuato, which describes a mountainous place with many frogs. Spanish colonists discovered silver in the region in the 1500’s. By the 1700’s, Guanajuato was one of the most important silver-producing regions in the world.
Guanajuato is regarded as the cradle of Mexican independence. In the early hours of Sept. 16, 1810, the Mexican priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla rang the bells of his church in the village of Dolores. When the church members had gathered, Hidalgo shouted the famous Grito de Dolores (Cry of Dolores), in which he urged Mexican peasants to rebel against their Spanish rulers.
Guanajuato became one of Mexico’s original states in 1824. During the 1800’s and the Mexican Revolution of 1910, Guanajuato was a stronghold of the Roman Catholic Church. A prolonged drought in the 1990’s contributed to many farmers migrating from rural Guanajuato to large cities in Mexico and the United States.
