Xicotlán

Xicotlán is one of Puebla's least populated municipalities: 1,312 people in 2020 spread over some 205 km² and about twenty settlements. The seat, with 717 residents, stands at about 1,290 m at the south-western tip of the state near the Guerrero line. The name comes from xicotli, bumblebee, and tlan, place: "place of bumblebees". It became a municipality in 1895.

The landscape is tangled ranges and canyons between 700 and 1,500 m. Nearly all the bedrock is Paleozoic schist, among the oldest rock in the state. It is hot: the climate is semi-arid and very warm, averaging 22 to 26 °C with 700 to 900 mm of summer rain. The Atoyac, the only river that runs all year, crosses the municipality on its way to the Balsas, and almost half the land is dry tropical forest, with woodland higher up; barely 6% is farmed.

In the seat stands the 16th-century parish church of San Juan Bautista, open every day of the year. Local cooking includes mole poblano, pipián and tlanipa, ash and plain masa tamales, squash sweets and jamoncillo, washed down with mezcal, aguardiente, atole and chocolate. It borders Chiautla, Chila de la Sal, Tulcingo, Albino Zertuche, Ixcamilpa de Guerrero and Cohetzala.