Huauchinango

History

The city grew from a pre-Hispanic settlement called Cuauchinanco, a Nahuatl name meaning roughly "within a wall of trees." Its first inhabitants were Chichimecs led by Nopaltzin, son of Xólotl, who settled by the Texcapa river between 1116 and 1121. In the mid-15th century the region was brought under the Triple Alliance and became a tribute province on an important route between the highlands and the Gulf lowlands. A few artificial mounds and a carved stone kept in the monastery sacristy survive from that time.

In 1527 Hernán Cortés entrusted the conquest of Cuauchinanco to Alonso de Villanueva. The Spanish reorganized the town into four neighborhoods that still exist: San Francisco, Santiago, Santa Catarina and San Juan. Augustinian friars arrived and established the monastery of San Agustín in 1541, with fray Juan Bautista de Moya as its first head.

Insurgent detachments were active here between 1812 and 1821. In 1861 the state congress raised the town to the rank of city with the name Huauchinango de Degollado, after the Reform general Santos Degollado. The town prospered as a stop for mule trains trading between the Gulf ports and Mexico City, and gained gas lighting, a telegraph and other public works under Porfirio Díaz. The Mexico-Tuxpan highway opened in 1943. The Feria de las Flores, held since 1938, grew out of the feast of the Señor del Santo Entierro. Huauchinango was named a Pueblo Mágico in 2015.