Tecali de Herrera

The name says most of it: Tecali comes from tetl, stone, and calli, house. Before the Spanish arrived this town in the Tepeaca valley already paid tribute in its stone, known as Tecali stone, and it appears as Tecalco on Moctezuma's tribute roll. It was founded around the 12th century by Totomihuaque and Cuauhtinchantlaca groups, as part of the Cuauhtinchan domain.

In 1520 Francisco de Montaño became its first encomendero. In 1861 the interim governor Francisco Ibarra made it a villa and municipal seat and added the name Herrera, after the liberal colonel Ambrosio Herrera, who on 25 August that year led the counter-attack against Ordóñez's conservatives. The date is still marked as the Gesta Heroica.

Opposite the main square stand the ruins of the Franciscan friary of Santiago, one of the oldest in Mexico: work began around 1554 and an inscription in the apse gives 1569. It is attributed to Claudio de Arciniega, who also designed Mexico City's cathedral. The Renaissance church has a basilica plan and a two-tier façade with a triangular pediment and a bell tower on the right. The friars left a century later after disputes with the bishop; the wooden roof is gone, removed, according to Manuel Toussaint, by General Calixto Mendoza to build a bullring, so the naves are open to the sky.

The ground here holds marble and limestone, and Tecali's workshops turn onyx into lamps, fountains, tables, ashtrays and cladding; a crafts fair is held on 25 August. St James is celebrated from 22 to 25 July. Typical food includes mole poblano, chilate largo, tlanipa tamales, carnitas and barbacoa, with tortillas cooked on clay griddles.