Bolívar issued the decree on February 15, 1825,[4][5] changing the name from "Huamanga" to "Ayacucho",[5] after the battle that decisively established the total independence of the nascent Peruvian Republic.

These celebrations include horse races featuring Peruvian Caballos de Paso and the traditional running of the bulls, known locally as the jalatoro or pascuatoro.

[citation needed] Vestiges of human settlements more than 15,000 years old have been found at the site of Pikimachay, about 25 km north of Ayacucho.

[8] New tribal cultures — well differentiated from the old Wari — arose in the Ayacucho region, over time these became a series of relatively powerful warlike chiefdoms that controlled region, according to colonial chroniclers these tribes were united into a confederacy by the time Inca began to expand, referred in the Spanish accounts as the "Chanca confederacy", an alliance formed by the Chanca, Parinacocha, Vilca, Sora, and Rucana (Lucana) cultures, among other ayllu clans.

[11] Due to the constant Incan rebellion led by Manco Inca Yupanqui against the Spanish in the zone, Pizarro was quick to populate the settlement with a small number of Spaniards brought from Lima and Cusco.

Ayacucho was significant in the colonial era for being an administrative center, a stopping-off point between Lima and Cuzco, and the residence of mercury miner from Huancavelica, as well as local land owners.

There were attempts to revive the city's fortunes, with a planned railway link to Peru's network, but the line was terminated in Huancavelica.

[12] The city's economy is based on agriculture and light manufacturing, including textiles, pottery, leather goods, and filigree ware.

It is a regional tourism destination, known for its 33 churches built in the colonial period, and for the nearby battlefield of La Quinua, where the Ayacucho battle was fought in 1824.

[12] In 1980, the far-left terrorist organization known as the Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso) used Ayachucho as its base for its campaign against the Peruvian government, even staging an assault on the Ayacucho prison in 1982.

Aside from precipitation and from a thermal standpoint, the city has the subtropical highland (Cfb) with uniform rainfall.Although there is no official delimitation defined, the metropolitan area of Ayacucho comprises 5 districts of the province of Huamanga.

According to the productive structure of 2006, Ayacucho contributed 1% of the national Gross Added Value (GVA), maintaining its share with respect to that recorded in the base year 1994.

In general, the colonial churches of Ayacucho combine Hispanic, Latin and Arabic elements with indigenous features, such as stones carved with motifs of the local flora and fauna.

The encomenderos, corregidors, landowners, miners, built their houses in Huamanga, thinking of the mansions in the style of the Spanish cities of Seville, Cordoba, Ávila and Granada of that time.

Ayacucho's crafts combine pre-Columbian techniques and traditions with Hispanic contributions and the permanent creativity of the region's inhabitants.

Huamanga stone is the local name given to alabaster, a white mineral, sometimes with shades ranging from grey or lead to sepia.

In this Latin American capital of Holy Week, the festival is celebrated for ten days, during which the population and tourists participate in religious ceremonies and processions, as well as in cultural, artistic, gastronomic and commercial activities.

During the month of February, the Carnaval de Ayacucho is a large celebration that officially lasts three days, but which begins a month in advance with the arrival of the rural troupes, which come from different places in the department, both to compete in the great rural troupe contest and to dance through the streets of the city showing the cultural richness of the place they come from, a richness that is found in their song and dance always to the rhythm of the carnival.

It is a stew prepared with small potatoes, roasted and ground peanuts, pieces of pork and beets (which give it its reddish color, puka in Quechua), seasoned with red chili pepper and other condiments.

The particularity of the dish in Ayacucho is the addition of a seasoning of ground and toasted red chili pepper, along with chopped mint.