Antiguo Cuscatlán (colloquially known as Antiguo) is a municipality in the La Libertad department of El Salvador, and its eastern tip lays in San Salvador Department part of the Metropolitan Area of San Salvador, southwest of San Salvador and southeast of Santa Tecla. The population was 48,027 at the 2010 census. Antiguo Cuscatlán can be translated as Old Jeweled City: Antiguo means ancient or old in Spanish, and Cuscatlán means jeweled city in Nahuat. The city used to be the capital of the Pipil or Cuzcatecs, before the Spanish conquest of the New World. The historic downtown sits on the foothills of La Cordillera del Bálsamo, and the city extends towards the Cordillera del Bálsamo on the south and on the foothills of the San Salvador Volcano on the north. The estimated per capita income for the city was $22,783 in 2013, which is 5.9 times higher than the national per capita (nominal). History According to Pipil texts Antiguo Cuscatlán was founded as Cuzcatlan in 1054 by Topiltzin Atzil, the last king of Tula of Anahuac. It was a city populated by ten thousand, with an additional twelve thousand people who lived in xacal, straw huts distributed at the edge of a maar (crater) which housed the sacred lake of Cuscatlan. In the contemporary Native language, Cuscatlán means Jewel City. On Saturday June 17, 1524, led by Pedro de Alvarado, the Spanish conquistadors found the doors of Cuscatlan, capital of the Lordship of Cuscatlan. The company consisted of one hundred fifty units of infantry, cavalry and one hundred other slaves, prepared to attack the kingdom and take over the regional capital. Despite the resistance, the Spanish were victorious and incorporated the municipality into the domains of the Iberian metropolis. The place was less relevant thereafter, as the town was caught in the dynamics of the rest of the country, which exploited its resources ending the colony. After the independence of Central America, San Salvador surpassed Antiguo Cuscatlan in importance, relegating it to a mere local capital. In the present day, Antiguo Cuscatlan has gained an important edge, hosting major institutions, plazas, corporative headquarters and the biggest U.S Embassy of the region. Economy The majority of the population in the municipality live in the urban center, it is by far the most urbanized municipality in the country, but there are still a couple of people that live in the rural areas