Banda Oriental
In 1516, the first European to arrive to present-day Uruguay was Spanish explorer Juan Díaz de Solís. In 1526, explorer Sebastian Cabot named the land "Banda Oriental del Uruguay", however, he did not establish any settlements in the land as he believed it to be unattractive for settlement. In the 1620s, Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries established the first missions in Banda Oriental. By the late 1600s, Spanish settlers came to Banda Oriental for cattle raising. In 1776, Banda Oriental officially became part of the Spanish Empire and was governed from the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata based in Buenos Aires.