Asunción is known as the “Mother of Cities” because it is one of the first cities in South America to be founded by European explorers. At one time, this city, originally called Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, was larger and more important than Buenos Aires. The city was founded on August 15, Assumption Day, in the year 1537. It soon became the administrative center for a Spanish colonial province that included much of modern-day Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina. Spanish missionaries also used this town as a base, from which they set out to convert the natives in the surrounding regions.

Over the next two centuries, Asunción developed into a mixed society of criollos, mestizos and aborigines. Agitation for self-rule grew until the Spanish governor of Paraguay, Bernardo de Velasco, was overthrown in 1811 and the country was declared independent. The revolutionary headquarters were in the home of Juana María de Lara, which is now a museum called the Casa de la Independencia . The city began an industrialization and modernization program by paving roads and building factories to stimulate the country’s economy, but political upheavals left Asunción unstable and effectively mothballed for many decades. Today, the country is growing again under the leadership of a somewhat democratic government, but still faces massive corruption problems.