Candelaria Loxicha

The Zapotec name is said to mean "place of pineapples". Candelaria Loxicha stands at 445 m in the Sierra Madre del Sur and is the seat of a municipality of 11,166 people (2020 census), 2,324 of whom live in the town itself; the rest are spread across 79 localities. About 62.5% of residents over five speak an indigenous language, mostly Zapotec.

Oral tradition says the settlement began some three hundred years ago, when people from San Agustín Loxicha gathered at a spot called Ranchería del río San Juan. After independence it came under San Agustín Loxicha; a decree of the Oaxaca Congress on 7 December 1881 gave it town status and its present name, and the municipality was separated from San Agustín on 23 October 1891.

The climate is warm and subhumid with summer rains, cooler and wetter in the north and hotter and drier in the south. Vegetation runs from cloud forest to medium forest and savanna, with mahogany and huanacaxtle trees, and wild boar and deer live in the hills. The town council is chosen by usos y costumbres, without political parties, with five municipal agencies. No official source publishes tourist sights; it is mostly visited in passing on Highway 175.