Cotija

History

In the first years of Spanish rule this valley was part of the encomienda of Tarecuato. In the last quarter of the 16th century the viceroy allowed Spanish families to settle it. According to the research of the local priest and historian José Romero Vargas, the founder was Melchor Manzo de Corona, who built his home around 1575 beside a stream later called the Río Claro, at a place the old inhabitants called Cotixa. Eleven more settlers arrived between 1581 and 1595 and turned mainly to cattle. Manzo's estate became the center of the group, with a simple chapel to Our Lady of the Pópolo and a Sunday market.

For generations the settlement depended on the parish of Tingüindín for baptisms, weddings and burials. In 1759 a royal land official joined the Rincón de Cotixa and the neighboring Llano de Titiacoro as the Congregation of Cotija, and in 1790 it was recognized as a pueblo. Over time, families of Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and southern French origin settled here, some bringing skills in dairy work that fed the local cheese tradition.

Cotija raised a detachment for the independence cause in 1810. In 1896 Governor Aristeo Mercado made it a city with the name Cotija de la Paz. It was sacked and burned in 1918 during the Revolution and took part in the Cristero War of the 1920s. Its cheese helped earn it Pueblo Mágico status in 2023.