as the city of Matanzas
was founded. According to some authorities the name is derived from the
Spanish _matanza_, which means slaughter or killing and it was supposed
to refer to the extermination of the Indians who had been the native
owners of that territory. Others derive the term from a corruption of
the word _martizaban_, which the Indians had adopted from the Castilian
when they wailed during the suffering inflicted upon them. Still others
try to establish a certain connection between that name and the
following story of Indian perfidy. It seems that some Spaniards had
engaged a number of Indians to carry them in their canoes from one end
of the bay to another. When they reached the middle of the bay, the
Indians left the boats, and hitting the Spaniards on the head with the
oars, tried to drown them, while they took to the mountains. Seven of
the victims succeeded in escaping from death by swimming to the shore;
but there they were caught by other natives, taken to the nearest pueblo
and hanged. One of them however, managed to get away and reach another
pueblo, whose cacique gave him shelter until the arrival of a Spanish
rescuing force under Narvaez. The cacique, preceded by three hundred men
carrying gifts, went to receive the party from Havana, leading the
prisoner by the hand. In addressing Narvaez and P. Casas, who were the
leaders, he told them that he had treated the man as if he had been his
own son, that he had guarded and protected him for three years and had
refused the strenuous demand of the other caciques to deliver him to
them, knowing that they would have killed him.

Whatever the origin of its name may be, Matanzas eventually lived down
its sinister significance. The bay of Matanzas with the canal opening
into it, had long been considered a point of great importance. For it
was patent that, if the British set out to capture it and succeeded in
establishing themselves there, the danger to Spanish commerce and
especially to that of Havana would be very grave. A village had existed
there from the time of the Spanish conquest; it had grown in population
and the surrounding land was well cultivated. Governor Manzanedas
decided at once to begin to fortify the bay. He re-organized the
administration of the place and raised it to the rank of a city, which
the authorities named after San Carlos Alcazar de Matanzas.

The solemn ceremonies of its foundation took place on the tenth of
October, 1693, in the