Tecalitlán

Tecalitlán is the seat of the municipality of the same name, at the southern tip of Jalisco, at about 1,130 metres above sea level and some 43 km from Ciudad Guzmán. At the 2020 census the town had 13,243 inhabitants. The name is Nahuatl and is read as "next to the stone houses". The region was conquered in 1522 by Cristóbal de Olid and Juan Rodríguez de Villafuerte, sent by Cortés, and the present town was founded by Miguel Ponce de León on 6 December 1776 as Valle de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Tecalitlán; it was made a pueblo in 1781.

Its fame is mariachi. Maestro Gaspar Vargas founded Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán here in 1897; his son Silvestre took it to win contests in Guadalajara and Mexico City, and it is now based in the capital. Since 2016 the town has held the Festival Cultural del Mariachi Los Sones in early October: the eighth edition, in 2025, ran from 2 to 12 October with eleven free galas at the Recinto Los Sones on the main square, and was a tribute to Silvestre Vargas.

The centre is built around the garden and the parish of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe. The Virgin is celebrated from 3 to 12 December, with the main velada on the 10th. Santa Cruz is marked on 3 May on the hill of that name, and the municipality has a lienzo charro, a bullring, a museum and several dams. Local food is birria and barbacoa. Sugar cane was once a major industry; agriculture (maize, beans, mango, peach) and livestock matter more today.