Matagalpa is a municipality

Municipality

A municipality is essentially an urban administrative division having corporate status and usually powers of self-government. It can also be used to mean the governing body of a municipality. A municipality is a general-purpose administrative subdivision, as opposed to a special-purpose district...

 in the Matagalpa department

Departments of Nicaragua

Nicaragua is a unitary republic, and for administrative purposes, it is divided into 15 departments and two self-governing regions based on the Spanish model:-Zelaya Department:...

 of Nicaragua

Nicaragua

Nicaragua is the largest country in the Central American American isthmus, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. The country is situated between 11 and 14 degrees north of the Equator in the Northern Hemisphere, which places it entirely within the tropics. The Pacific Ocean...

. The capital city of the department, Matagalpa

Matagalpa

Matagalpa is a city in Nicaragua, the capital of the department of Matagalpa. The city has a population of 109,100 , while the population of the department is more than 480,000. Matagalpa is Nicaragua's fifth largest city and one of its most commercially active outside of Managua...

, is located within the municipality.

Matagalpa is one of the main urban areas of the country and an important commercial center and cattleman of the region. In it big agricultural areas are located virgin forests, and locations of gold as San Ramón's mines.

The cultivation and prosecution of the coffee, the production of flour and the textile factory are their main industrial activities.

One of their most important historical monuments is the cathedral that dates of the Spanish colonial period.

Matagalpa is also called "La perla del Septentrion".