When the Franciscan monks arrived in 1650 there was already an Indian community at Clarines. It was officially founded on 7 April 1594 by Francisco de Vides, a Spanish adventurer who came from the Province of Huelva. Clarines did not change much until the oil boom of the 1960s. In 1852, the population of Clarines was 4,289, including 72 people identified as white and 3,321 people identified as indigenous. Alfredo Armas Alfonzo, Venezuelan historian and critic, was born in Clarines in 1921. Jaime Lusinchi, former president of Venezuela, was born in Clarines in 1924
