Church, convent and Arch of Santa Catalina

In 1609, four nuns of Convento de La Concepcion obtained a permission to establish the Convento de Santa Catarina. The second one in the city opened in September, 1647. By the end of the century, the nun population had over grown that it was necessary to get additional land to be used as a vegetable garden that was purchased on the opposite side from the street. To maintain the conditions of a cloister, an arch was built where nuns could walk through without an outdoor visual contact. This was completed in 1693 and rebuilt in the XIX Century.