Santa María Tlahuitoltepec

Tlahuitoltepec sits at about 2,239 m in the Sierra Mixe, part of Oaxaca's Sierra Norte, and is the seat of the municipality of the same name. The 2010 census counted 3,452 people in the town, and the 2015 intercensal survey 8,922 in the whole municipality. People speak Ayuujk, the Mixe language, and the town is run by customary law: assemblies elect communal, land, school and church authorities, and tequio, shared community labour, still builds public works and festivities.

Oral tradition says the ancestors walked toward the sacred mountain, Cempoaltépetl, and that a peacock flew off the peak and landed in a watered clearing; the people read it as a sign and stayed. According to Spanish Wikipedia, the patron-saint fiesta includes a visit to Cempoaltépetl. The hills produce tejocotes, called pakwäj in Mixe.

Music is what the town is known for. The Centro de Capacitación Musical y Desarrollo de la Cultura Mixe (CECAM) has run since 1977, with a children's programme, an induction level for secondary-school graduates, and a professional technical course in Oaxacan traditional music certified with INBAL. Its Banda Filarmónica plays concerts and patron-saint fiestas. A Oaxaca cultural-tour listing says the town has six music schools and that nearly everyone plays an instrument. In 2010 Tropical Storm Matthew hit the town with landslides.