La Imperial or Ciudad Imperial was a city founded by Pedro de Valdivia

Pedro de Valdivia

Pedro Gutiérrez de Valdivia or Valdiva was a Spanish conquistador and the first royal governor of Chile. After serving with the Spanish army in Italy and Flanders, he was sent to South America in 1534, where he served as lieutenant under Francisco Pizarro in Peru, acting as his second in command...

 on April 16, 1552 and named in honor of the Emperor Charles V

Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I, of the Spanish Empire from 1516 until his voluntary retirement and abdication in favor of his younger brother Ferdinand I and his son Philip II in 1556.As...

. It was abandoned on April 5, 1600 and destroyed as a result of the Mapuche Uprising of 1598 during the War of Arauco. The ruins were called Antigua Imperial. A city was refounded there in 1882 under the name Carahue

Carahue

Carahue is a city and commune in southern Chile. It is located 56 km west of Temuco, on the northern bank of the Imperial River.The city was founded as La Imperial April 16, 1552 by Pedro de Valdivia....

.

Sources

• Francisco Solano Asta-Buruaga y Cienfuegos, Diccionario geográfico de la República de Chile, D. Appleton y Compania, Nueva York, 1899
  • Imperial (Ciudad), pg. 329-330
• Crescente Errázuriz
  Crescente Errázuriz
  thumb|300px|Monsignor Crescente Errázuriz Valdivieso.Monsignor Crescente Errázuriz Valdivieso was a Chilean Dominican friar, Roman Catholic archbishop of Santiago, professor, writer and historian...
  
  , Seis años de la historia de Chile: 23 de diciembre de 1598- 9 de abril de 1605: memoria histórica, Impr. Nacional, Sanitiago de Chile, 1881.