Taniche

Taniche is one of those municipalities that is a single locality: 887 residents in 2020 on about 11 square kilometres, at 1,426 metres, so close to Ejutla de Crespo that the two towns nearly touch. It grew out of a prosperous hacienda founded around 1770, which sources spell sometimes Taniche and sometimes Caniche. Today it is governed by usos y costumbres.

Its historical claim is a person: Manuel Sabino Crespo, a priest and lawyer, was born on the hacienda on 3 January 1778. He joined Morelos's forces, was elected deputy to the Congress of Chilpancingo and, after the insurgent defeat, was shot on 19 October 1815. In 1885 the Oaxaca Congress gave his name to neighbouring Ejutla, which has been Ejutla de Crespo ever since.

The landscape is farmland and grazing, with mesquite, hierba buena and gordolobo on uncultivated ground; the municipality has a single river, the Ejutla. The first primary school opened in 1979. Taniche is part of the Ejutla district, one of Oaxaca's mezcal zones, where thirteen municipalities distil in some fifty palenques. The village's main celebration is reported around 25 March, with music, dancing and a calenda. For a visitor to Ejutla, Taniche is a short stop at the birthplace of the man the district seat is named after.