Spanish forces continue to move into Argentina from the Pacific coast over the Andes.

Pedro del Castillo founds a city on March 2, 1561, in a region of foothills and high plains, naming it Ciudad de Mendoza del Nuevo Valle de La Rioja after the governor of Chile, Don García Hurtado de Mendoza.

The area had been populated before the 1560s by three tribes, the Huarpes, the Puelches, and the Incas.

The Huarpes had devised a system of irrigation that is later developed by the Spanish, allowing for an increase in population that might not have otherwise occurred.

The system is still evident today in the wide trenches that run along the city streets.

Two of the main industries of present-day Mendoza area are olive oil production and wine making; the region around Greater Mendoza is the largest wine producing area in Latin America.