Jilotepec

What to see and do

A flight of steps leads from the plaza up to San Pedro y San Pablo, one of the older parishes in Mexico. Notice the single tower, the plain facade, the arch over the entrance and the stone atrium cross, the only piece left of the Franciscan convent, which stood on the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro. Beside the garden is the arcaded Palacio Municipal, and close by are the Alameda Central and the Casa de Cultura Amalia Márquez Padilla. Out of town the choices are many: the Las Peñas ecotourism park in Dexcani Alto, the Danxhó dam and park, the Xhimojay, La Avellana and La Arena reservoirs, the Parque de los Sabinos in San Pablo Huantepec and the Las Sequoias urban park.

Food and crafts

Two pre-Hispanic delicacies define local eating: huitlacoche, the smoky blue-gray corn fungus, and gusanos de maguey, nutty, crisp agave caterpillars, most often the white kind. Try regional cooking at the food stalls of Mercado San José or the big Friday tianguis. A local distillery makes corn whiskey and Nixta, a sweet liqueur of heritage corn.

Festivals

The celebration that sets Jilotepec apart is the Xhita carnival, held in the weeks before Lent, when dancers take to the streets in wigs of cattle hair topped with large horns.

History

Jilotepec is old Otomi country; its Otomi name is Madönxi. The name used today is Nahuatl and means on the hill of tender corn, and its glyph in the Codex Mendoza shows a hill topped by two young ears of maize. According to the record, the Mexica ruler Acamapichtli conquered the area in 1379.

After the Spanish Conquest the Franciscans took charge of evangelization, with friars Alonso de Rangel and Antonio de Ciudad Rodrigo the first to preach here. In the 16th century they built the church of San Pedro y San Pablo as part of a convent, of which only the atrium cross survives. When silver was found in Zacatecas and Guanajuato in the middle of that century, the royal road north, the Camino Real de Tierra Adentro, was laid through Jilotepec, and the town became a stop on New Spain's main trade artery. Spanish settlers arrived during the viceroyalty, and both Spanish and French families came in the Porfirian era.

The present municipality was created on March 11, 1824. The town was long called Jilotepec de Abasolo and has carried the name Jilotepec de Molina Enríquez since 1986. The Xhita carnival, danced to ask for a good harvest, keeps the Otomi roots of the place in view.