Atolinga is one of the 58

municipalities A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

in the state of

Zacatecas Zacatecas, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Zacatecas, is one of the Political divisions of Mexico, 31 states of Mexico. It is divided into Municipalities of Zacatecas, 58 municipalities and its capital city is Zacatecas City, Zacatec ...

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. It is located on the southern part of the state of Zacatecas and is bordered by the municipalities of

Tepechitlán The municipality of Tepechitlán is located in the southwestern portion of the Mexican state of Zacatecas. It is located between 21º33'49" and 21º44'00" latitude north and 103º09'07" and 103º32'01" longitude west with an average altitude of ...

and

Florencia de Benito Juárez Florencia may refer to: Places *Florencia de Benito Juárez, a municipality in the state of Zacatecas, Mexico *Florencia, Caquetá, a town and municipality in the Department of Caqueta, Colombia *Florencia, Cauca, a town and municipality in the De ...

. To the east it is bordered by

Tlaltenango de Sánchez Román Tlaltenango, Mexican toponym, may mean: * Tlaltenango de Sánchez Román, Zacatecas Zacatecas, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Zacatecas, is one of the Political divisions of Mexico, 31 states of Mexico. It is divided into Municipal ...

and to the north and west by the state of

Jalisco Jalisco, officially the Free and Sovereign State of Jalisco, is one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the 32 Political divisions of Mexico, Federal Entities of Mexico. It is located in western Mexico and is bordered by s ...

. The municipality covers a total surface area of ."Atolingo", Encyclopedia de Municipios

History

Before the arrival of the Spanish to the area, the region around Atolinga was inhabited by indigenous people of the

Caxcan The Caxcan are an ethnic group who are Indigenous to western and north-central Mexico, particularly the regions corresponding to modern-day Zacatecas, southern Durango, Jalisco, Colima, Aguascalientes, Nayarit. The Caxcan language is most often ...

and Tepecan ethnic groups. The first Spanish contact with these people must have been in 1530 when Pedro Almíndez Chirino went through the Valley of Tlaltenango on a northbound expedition. The first land grantee of the area was Pedro Sernosa, who later sold his land to Juan Fernández de Jara Quemada. The town formed part of the jurisdiccion of Tlaltenango for both ecclesiastical purposes and governmental purposes until the beginning of the 1800s. In 1814, a plea was made by the citizenry that the community be granted its own town council and status as a municipality due to the long distance from the municipal seat and the ascending local population. The plea spells out that the town counted with nearly 700 "souls" and that within a radius of two leagues lived more than 3,700 people. Most of this towns families are large families with the same last name. The most common are : Carlos, Bugarin, Castaneda, Delgado, Saldana, Nanes and Salinas.

Population

In the 2005 census Atolinga, reported a population of 2,738.Link to tables of population data from Census of 2005
INEGI: Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografía e Informática Of these, 1,453 lived in the municipal seat and the remainder lived in surrounding rural communities.

References

{{Zacatecas Municipalities of Zacatecas