Garay, Juan de [key], c.1528–1583, Spanish conquistador, refounder of Buenos Aires. He went to Peru (1544) in the train of the first viceroy, Blasco Núñez Vela, and was active against Gonzalo Pizarro in the civil war. From 1548 to 1568 his activity, as a soldier and colonizer, was centered in Upper Peru (present-day Bolivia). Moving to Asunción (Paraguay) in 1568, he quickly became prominent in the provincial government. He founded Santa Fé (in present-day Argentina) in 1573. While lieutenant governor of the provinces of the Río de la Plata (1574–83), he made a permanent settlement in 1580 at Buenos Aires, which, first founded in 1536, had been abandoned in 1541.
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