It replaced the governorates of Quijos and Maynas, excluding the latter's village of Papallacta.

The territory was created through the real cédula of July 15, 1802,[5] which transferred the governorates of Maynas and Quijos (excluding the village of Papallacta) into the Viceroyalty of Peru.

[6] It was incorporated into the Protectorate of Peru as a department with the name of Quijos and Maynas[7] following a war for the territory's independence that lasted from 1821 to 1822, during the Spanish American wars of independence.

[1][8] After the wars of independence in Ecuador and Peru, the zone became extremely relevant for both countries, as it was a main focus of the Ecuadorian–Peruvian territorial dispute, which escalated in 1941 as the Ecuadorian–Peruvian War and continued to a lesser extent with skirmishes in 1995 and in 1998, the latter leading to the signing of the Brasilia Presidential Act in 1998.

Additionally, it was also a focus of the territorial dispute between Colombia and Peru that escalated in 1933 with the Colombia–Peru War which concluded with the signing of the Rio Protocol the following year.