Chontla

Chontla is a town of 2,298 people and the seat of the municipality of the same name in the lower Huasteca of northern Veracruz. It stands at 260 metres at the foot of the Sierra de Otontepec, known locally as the Sierra de Chontla, whose streams water the municipality on their way to the Topila estuary and eventually the Pánuco river. The climate is hot and extreme, averaging 24.6 °C, with about 1,555 mm of rain falling mostly in summer and early autumn, and dry spells.

The Nahuatl name has several readings: "place of long hair", "woman with long hair" or perhaps "where the great mountain is", after one of the Otontepec summits. The town began as a very old Huastec settlement, already called Santa Catalina Chontla in 1592. From 1847 mestizo and Nahua settlers arrived in what had been purely Huastec country, a mix the municipal coat of arms shows as three pairs of footprints. During the Revolution the town was burned in 1915 by Higinio Melgoza's santamarillero forces, who attacked it again in 1920. The coat of arms also shows the obelisk raised in 1988 when the paved road from Naranjos was completed. The writer and teacher Manuel C. Tello came from here, and the kindergarten and primary school he founded bear his name.

The main feast is Santa Catarina on 25 and 26 November, with negritos, mecos and rebozo dances, fireworks, rosaries and novenas. On 3 May people climb the Cerro de la Cruz, a hill about 120 metres high 2.4 km southeast of town, for the bricklayers' day mass, and on 1 and 2 November families build altars and keep vigil in the cemeteries. Local food includes zacahuil, bocoles, dried meat, cheese, requesón and alfajores, washed down with pulque, atole or cane liquor. Farms grow maize, chiles, mangoes, limes, custard apples and sweet potatoes, and raise cattle.