One of the first sev­en vil­lages found­ed by the Spaniards in Cuba, Cam­aguey played a promi­nent role as the urban cen­tre of an inland ter­ri­to­ry ded­i­cat­ed to cat­tle breed­ing and the sug­ar indus­try. Set­tled in its cur­rent loca­tion in 1528, the town devel­oped on the basis of an irreg­u­lar urban pat­tern that con­tains a sys­tem of large and minor squares, ser­pen­tine streets, alleys and irreg­u­lar urban blocks, high­ly excep­tion­al for Latin Amer­i­can colo­nial towns locat­ed in plain ter­ri­to­ries. The 54 ha His­toric Cen­tre of Cam­aguey con­sti­tutes an excep­tion­al exam­ple of a tra­di­tion­al urban set­tle­ment rel­a­tive­ly iso­lat­ed from main trade routes. The Span­ish col­o­niz­ers fol­lowed medieval Euro­pean influ­ences in terms of urban lay­out and tra­di­tion­al con­struc­tion tech­niques brought to the Amer­i­c­as by their masons and con­struc­tion mas­ters. The prop­er­ty reflects the influ­ence of numer­ous styles through the ages: neo­clas­si­cal, eclec­tic, Art Deco, Neo-colo­­nial as well as some Art Nou­veau and ratio­nal­ism.