Santa Clara Huitziltepec

The Nahuatl name of this village is built from huitztli, thorn, tiltic, black, tepetl, hill, and the locative co, and translates as "on the hill of black thorns". The first half of the name comes from its patron, Saint Clare of Assisi, to whom the 17th-century parish church is dedicated, the most notable monument in the whole municipality. Santa Clara is the seat of government of Huitziltepec; the census counted 2,907 people here in 2020, and the houses sit at 1,912 metres, about 45 km in a straight line southeast of the state capital.

Huitziltepec is a small municipality: it covers just 51 km² and its average altitude is around 1,900 metres. A little over half the land (55.75%) is farmed and more than a third is still covered in scrub, which gives the landscape the dry, thorny look that seems to explain the name. Average temperatures run from 16 to 18 °C and 600 to 700 mm of rain fall each year, nearly all in the wet season. The whole territory drains to the Balsas basin, within the Atoyac–Balcón del Diablo sub-basin, and it is crossed by the intermittent Tlanunatl stream, which only carries water in the rainy months.

In people's homes there is basketry, pottery and palm weaving, the area's traditional crafts. On the table come mole poblano, pipián and tamales; for dessert there is tejocote preserve, guayabate and guava paste, and to drink, atole, chocolate and mezcal. On feast days men dress as charros and women as china poblana. The indigenous language has almost vanished: in 2020 only 38 people in the municipality said they spoke Otomí, Totonac or Nahuatl. About 4 km to the south lies Santa Cruz Huitziltepec, already in Molcaxac, which shares the hill's name.