Nieves

Nieves is a town of nearly 5,900 people in the semi-desert of northern Zacatecas, 1,914 metres up, and the seat of General Francisco R. Murguía municipality. The Aguanaval River, known locally as the río de Nieves, runs past it northward toward Durango through mesquite and prickly-pear scrub.

Francisco de Ibarra's expedition reached the spot on August 5, 1558, camping beside a spring west of today's streets. It was the feast of Our Lady of the Snows, so the friars travelling with him named the place Santa María de las Nieves; the caiman on the municipal coat of arms comes from the name they gave the spring, Ojo de Agua el Caimán. Silver mining earned it the name Real de Minas in the early 1700s, later shortened to Nieves. After independence it headed one of the districts (partidos) set up by Zacatecas's first state constitution in 1825. The municipality took its present name in 1964, after a revolutionary general born in Mazapil.

On February 4, 1911, Luis Moya, a Maderista who had adopted Nieves as his home, captured the town in one of the first actions of the Revolution in Zacatecas. He was killed that May taking Sombrerete and buried in the San Lorenzo cemetery here. His monument stands on the Plaza Constitución.

Farming and trade keep the town going now, and the time to come is the regional fair of August 1-6 for Our Lady of the Snows: pilgrimages start on July 27 with feather dancers and matachines, and feast days bring reliquia, beef in red chile served with pasta soups.