The province of Azuay is one of the 24 provinces that make up the Republic of Ecuador, located in the south of the country, in the geographical area known as the interandean region or sierra, mainly on the basin of Paute in the northeast and the basin of Jubones in the southwestern Its administrative capital is the city of Cuenca, which is also its largest and most populated city. It occupies a territory of about 8,639 km², being the twelfth province of the country by extension. It borders Cañar to the north, Loja to the south, Guayas to the west, El Oro to the south-west, Morona Santiago to the east and Zamora Chinchipe to the southeast.
In the Azua territory there are 712,127 people, according to the last national census, being the fifth most populated province of the country after Guayas, Pichincha, Manabí and Los Ríos. The Province of Azuay is made up of 15 cantons, from which 27 urban parishes and 60 rural parishes are derived. According to the last territorial order, the province of Azuay will belong to a region also included by the provinces of Cañar and Morona Santiago, although it is not officially formed, called the South Central Region. It is one of the most important administrative, economic, financial and commercial centers of Ecuador. The development of the industry in Azuay, in general, was based on the manual skills of its inhabitants.
It has a very unique importance for the history of the austro of Ecuador, for being a midpoint between the coast and the Amazon, from ancestral time was established as a meeting place between cultures, traders and events of religious connotation. The first recorded settlements date back to 10 thousand years old in Chobshi and Cubilán. He had different migratory periods from the mountains such as the Cañaris. Later it was conquered by the Incas under Tupac Yupanqui. The Spanish colonization occurred when Francisco Pizarro commissioned Captain Rodrigo Núñez de Bonilla to exercise the functions of encomendero in the repartimiento of the Province of the Cañaris or Tomebamba in 1538. During that period the maximum entity and precursor of the province would be the Corregimiento de Cuenca, after the independence war and the annexation of Ecuador to Gran Colombia, the Province of Cuenca was created on June 25,1824, which makes it one of the first 7 provinces of Ecuador.
This province is the corollary of the subdivision of the extinct Department of Azuay.