Cardonal

Cardonal is the seat of the municipality of the same name, in the highlands of central Hidalgo, at 2,048 metres. Before its Spanish name it was known in Otomí as Bojay, "within the earth"; the Spanish changed it to Cardonal, probably for the abundance of cardón cacti. According to Wikipedia, Alfonso de Villaseca founded the town under its present name, and by about 1545 Augustinian friars from Metztitlán were already preaching here. It became an ayuntamiento in 1827, within the Ixmiquilpan district, and a municipalidad of the Actopan district in 1865.

It is a small place: 755 inhabitants in 2020, barely 3.89% of a municipality of 19,431 people and 80 localities, where 56.71% speak an Indigenous language, above all the Otomí of the Mezquital Valley; in the seat itself 156 people, 20.66%, do. The municipality spreads across highland and canyon, lives on beans, pulque maguey and livestock, and has a weekly tianguis. The weather station gives a yearly mean of 17.4 °C and about 388 mm of rain, with lows that have touched -8 °C in December.

The building that organises town life is the parish of the Purísima Concepción, Baroque in style; tradition dates it to the 16th century, to a crucifix brought from Europe that was donated and led to the building. The image of the Señor de Mapethé is lodged here for several weeks: it comes down from its sanctuary after the fifth Friday of Lent and goes back up, according to an April 2026 report, in a procession of about seven kilometres with more than two thousand participants asking for rain and good harvests.

Cardonal is also the administrative gateway to the Tolantongo area: the canyon and the caves lie inside the municipality, and Tolantongo is listed among its localities. The caves have their own page; what is here is the town.