Almolonga

Atl, water; moloni, to spring forth; and the place suffix -can: Almolonga means "place where water springs", a telling name in a district where almost every stream runs only in the rainy season. Official records also list it as Todos Santos. With 1,483 residents in 2020 and 428 homes, it is one of the main localities of Tepexi de Rodríguez; it sits at 1,821 m, about 13 km in a straight line south-southwest of the municipal seat and some 68 km from Puebla city, closer to Tehuacán (61 km) than to Atlixco (69 km).

The municipality, almost 399 km², fills the middle of the Llanos de Tepexi, broken ground ringed by the Zapotitlán, Acatlán and Soltepec ranges. It was founded by Popolocas on the border of three languages, Popoloca, Mixtec and Nahuatl; old Tepexi paid tribute to the Aztecs and after the Conquest the town was refounded on its present site. In colonial times it was the alcaldía of Tepexi de la Seda, and in the War of Independence an insurgent stronghold. From that past survive the church of Santo Domingo de Guzmán and the town hall, both 16th century, and the council house of 1604. The big regional fiesta is that of the Señor de Huajoyuca: on the Thursday before the first Friday of Lent the image leaves at night in procession and returns after five in the morning.

The climate ranges from semi-warm to mild, averaging 16 to 24 °C with 600 to 900 mm of rain; about 38% of the land is farmed and the rest is tropical forest, scrub and grassland. Besides farming, people work the marble quarries, and the local rocks hold so many fossils that the municipality runs the Pie de Vaca site museum, also called the Museo Regional Mixteco Tlayúa. Local hands weave palm, raffia and pochote fibre, carve onyx and make pottery; the kitchen offers guaxmole, pit barbecue, cecina, roasted or fried grasshoppers, tetelas and alache broth, with mezcal, pulque and granillo atole.