San Mateo Zoyamazalco

Zoyamazalco comes from Nahuatl zoyatl, palm, maxaltie, fork, and the locative co: "where the palms fork". The name fits Coyotepec, where palm groves cover about 13% of the land and palm and zoyate are the raw material for petates and tenates, the region's woven mats and baskets. Saint Matthew the Evangelist is the village patron. In 2020 it had 599 residents, at about 1,903 metres above sea level. From above you see a compact grid of a few tree-shaded blocks, surrounded by brown rain-fed plots and the odd green patch of irrigated land.

Coyotepec is a small, thinly populated municipality: in 2010 it had seven localities and 2,339 residents, spread over a territory that is 0.39% of the state, between 1,700 and 2,200 metres. It borders Ixcaquixtla, Juan N. Méndez, Atexcal, Totoltepec de Guerrero and Tepexi de Rodríguez, and belongs to the Sierras del Sur de Puebla. Most of it is a plain on rocky ground with thin soils, broken only here and there by steep volcanic slopes and a basalt plateau. Water drains toward the Acatlán river, in the Atoyac and Balsas basin, through streams that only run in the rainy season, such as the Magdalena.

The climate is warmer than in the central valleys: averages run from 16 to 22 °C, with 600 to 800 mm of rain, and a sixth of the municipality is already semi-warm. A little under half the land is farmed; the rest is scrub, palm grove and small remnants of low forest and woodland. The municipal seat keeps a sixteenth-century parish church dedicated to San Vicente, and Popoloca and Nahuatl are still spoken in the municipality. Besides palm weaving, people carve bone and work leather. On the table you find mutton and goat barbacoa, mole poblano, chicharrón and carnitas, calabazate for dessert and, to drink, atole, chocolate, aguardiente and mezcal.