The beginnings of Florida Street date back to the founding of Buenos Aires in 1580, when it was hewn as a primitive path uphill from the banks of the Río de la Plata. Its first official name was "San José," enacted by Governor Miguel de Salcedo in 1734. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the street was known popularly as "Calle del Correo" (Post Street) in reference to the post office located on what later became Perú Street (the southern continuation of Florida Street). It was also later known as "Empedrado" (Cobbled Street). Improved with boulders brought from Montevideo beginning in 1789, it became the first paved street in the city (a section of the original cobblestone pavement is displayed behind the entrance to the Cathedral Station on Diagonal Norte Avenue). Following the British invasions of the Río de la Plata in 1808, the street was called Baltasar Unquera, in homage to an aide-de-camp to Viceroy Santiago de Liniers, fallen in the fight against Admiral William Carr Beresford. The street was first named "Florida" in 1821. The name was designated in honor of the battle fought in 1814 in Upper Peru against the royalists during the Argentine War of Independence. Governor Juan Manuel de Rosas renamed the street "Perú" in 1837, and in 1857, the name was returned to the present one.