Tarija is the capital of the Département of Tarija (Bolivia). It is located on banks of Río Guadalquivir (Nuevo Guadalquivir), in the center of a pleasant moderated valley with 1  854 m of altitude.
Coordinates: .

Population in 2001: roughly 135  000 inhabitants.

History

The town of Tarija was founded the July 4th 1574 under the name of Villa of San Bernardo of Frontera de Tarixa by some Luis of Fuentes there Vargas (native of Seville), on left bank of the río Nuevo Guadalquivir, according to the orders of the Vice-Roi of Lima Francisco de Toledo. It owes its name with Francisco de Tarija, Andalusian member of the forwarding of Diego de Almagro, which was first Spanish to visit the valley populated by an Indian ethnos group called “  tomata  ”. Mixture of Spanish and tomatas were born mongrel people, the chapacos.

One of the main objectives about the Viceroy to found a European colonial city there, was to face the incursions of the Indians Chiriguanos since the Gran Chaco.

Thanks to its soft and moderate climate, the agricultural productions and pastoral have prospéré  quickly;: Vine, Corn, orange S, Olive S, cattle bovine, porcine, ovine and equine. That supported an important rooting of Spanish population and the formation of a culture of the type gaucho (as in the close Argentine).

Évêché

• Diocese of Tarija

• Cathedral of Tarija

External bonds

• the Alliance Fran1caise of Tarija