Guanajuato is a Mexican city, capital of the state of the same name, located in the municipality of Guanajuato. It is in the northern center of Mexico. According to 2010 figures, its population is 184,239 inhabitants, part of the Bajío macro region. The history of the city dates back to pre-Columbian times. In its early years it was called Mo-o-ti by the Chichimecas, meaning "place of metals." Later the Aztecs gave it the name Paxtitlan, which in Spanish means "place of straw." Its current name derives from kuanasï = rana uata = hill being written correctly in Purépecha as Kuanasïuatu, which means "mountainous place of frogs".
During the Spanish colonial period it reached a great development due to the exploitation of its gold and silver deposits. At the beginning of the 19th century it was the scene of one of the most outstanding insurgent triumphs, the taking of the Alhóndiga de Granaditas by the army of Miguel Hidalgo and the subsequent massacre of the viceregal guard and the Spanish civilians who were refugees there. The city of Guanajuato is also a university city with an intense cultural life whose culmination is the International Cervantino Festival, the most important artistic meeting in Mexico and Latin America, was declared a World Heritage Site in 1988 as a cultural asset under the name "Historic city of Guanajuato and adjacent mines" world heritage.