Ponce is both a city and a municipality in southern part of Puerto Rico. The city is the seat of the municipal government. The City of Ponce is the second largest city in Puerto Rico outside of the San Juan metropolitan area, and is named after Juan Ponce de Leon y Loayza, the great-grandson of Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de Leon. Ponce is often referred to as La Perla del Sur (The Pearl of the South), La Ciudad Señorial (The Noble City), and La Ciudad de las Quenepas (Genip City). The city of Ponce serves as the governmental seat of the autonomous municipality as well as the regional hub for various Government of Puerto Rico entities, such as the Judiciary of Puerto Rico. It is also the regional center for various other Commonwealth and federal government agencies. The city is also the seat of a Catholic Dioceis. The Municipality of Ponce, officially the Autonomous Municipality of Ponce, is located in the Southern Coastal Plain region of the island, south of Adjuntas, Utuado and Jayuya; east of Penuelas; west of Juana Diaz; and bordered on the south by the Caribbean Sea. The region of what is now Ponce belonged to the Taino Guaynia region, which stretched along the southern coast of Puerto Rico. The region was led by cacique Agueybana. He was one of the caciques that greeted Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de Leon when he came to the island in 1508.
The coat of arms of Ponce contains a red and black coloured shield. There is a five tower gold crown that indicates that Ponce is a city by royal decree. As an exterior frame to shield, there is a sugarcane plant on the right of the shield, and to the left a coffee tree branch. The shield of Ponce is divided by a diagonal line that crosses straight from the superior end to the left inferior end. In this divided field is the color red (for the fire that almost destroyed the city), that covers the superior right portion and the color black (for the ashes after that fire). On that black and red background is a yellow lion with black mane, walking towards the left of the shield, facing right of the shield. The lion is on a bridge, meaning that you must cross a river to enter the city by any region. The shield is bordered by a coffee plant branch and a sugar cane plant, in which the early economy of the city was based.
