When the province was made in 1885, it had the land of the present provinces of Hermanas Mirabal, Duarte and María Trinidad Sánchez provinces and the southern part of the present Espaillat province. But when the Duarte province was made in 1896, the Espaillat province lost most of the land east of the Hermanas Mirabal province; in 1945, the land north of the "Cordillera Septentrional" was added to the Espaillat province.