Note IV'-31 — Chapter IV · OBSERVATIONS ON NEW SPAIN.[IV'-1]

The province which Pike calls indifferently Biscay and New Biscay was properly Nueva Vizcaya. It was named Reino de la Nueva Vizcaya by Francisco de Ibarra, who invaded it about 1560-70, and retained the name until after the independence. As a colonial division of New Spain it had been originally called Copala, and was much more extensive than Pike's Biscay, as it corresponded to the present states of Sonora, Sinaloa, Chihuahua, Durango, and a southern part of Coahuila. This region was included among the Provincias Internas in 1777, and such was its status in Pike's time; but meanwhile it had become contracted in extent by the exclusion of Sonora and Sinaloa, so that in Pike's time it was little if any more than equivalent to the two present states of Chihuahua and Durango. Present Chihuahua has Sinaloa and Durango on the S. Present Durango is surrounded by Sinaloa, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Zacatecas, and Jalisco.