Jalisco is neither Aztec nor Mayan. The state sits in western Mexico, far from both the Aztec capital in central Mexico and the Maya homelands in southern Mexico and Central America. Before Spanish contact in 1522, Jalisco was home to a diverse collection of its own indigenous groups, many of them completely distinct from the empires most people learn about in school. A colonial-era account recorded that 72 different languages were spoken across the region.
Who Actually Lived in Jalisco
The indigenous landscape of Jalisco was complex and fragmented, with no single empire controlling the territory. Several major groups occupied different parts of the state. The Caxcanes, a partly nomadic people, lived in the northern section with religious and population centers at Teul, Tlaltenango, and Juchipila. The Cocas inhabited a broad swath of central and southern Jalisco, stretching from Guadalajara south to Sayula and east to Lake Chapala. The Tecuexes controlled a large area of northern Jalisco from Magdalena and Tequila in the west to Jalostotitlán in the east, with their territory extending just south of present-day Guadalajara.
Many of these groups belonged to a broader category the Spanish called Chichimeca Indians, a loose label for the nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples of northern and western Mexico. The Guachichiles, considered among the fiercest of the Chichimeca groups, occupied the northeastern Los Altos region and fought a decades-long war against the Spanish from 1550 to 1590. The Guamares, who lived in eastern Jalisco and Guanajuato, included a subgroup called the Ixtlachichimecas, who painted their faces and bodies with limestone pigments.
The Cora people primarily lived in what is now Nayarit but also occupied the northwestern fringes of Jalisco. The Huichol (Wixárika), who still live in the region today across Jalisco, Nayarit, Zacatecas, and Durango, may descend from the Guachichiles, having shifted over time from a nomadic lifestyle to settled agriculture.
Why Nahuatl Place Names Can Be Misleading
The name “Jalisco” itself comes from Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs (Mexica), which can create the impression that the region was part of the Aztec world. It wasn’t. A small group called the Cuyutecos, who settled in southwestern Jalisco in towns like Talpa, Mascota, and Tecolotlán, did speak a Nahua language related to that of the Mexica. But their presence is believed to have been a late arrival, not evidence of Aztec control over the region. The Aztec Empire’s western reach was blocked by the powerful Purépecha (Tarascan) state in present-day Michoacán, which sat between central Mexico and Jalisco like a wall.
When the Spanish pushed into Jalisco in the early 1500s, they brought indigenous allies from the south, including Nahuatl speakers. These allies and the colonial administration spread Nahuatl terminology across the region, stamping it onto place names even where the local population spoke entirely different languages.
Jalisco’s Own Ancient Civilization
Far from being a cultural backwater between two famous empires, Jalisco produced a sophisticated civilization that built structures found nowhere else in Mesoamerica. The Teuchitlán culture, active from roughly 300 BCE to 450 CE, constructed massive circular pyramids called guachimontones in the Tequila Valleys. The largest concentration of these buildings is at the archaeological site of Los Guachimontones, where bull’s-eye shaped structures feature a circular base, a ring-shaped platform, a central altar, and an even number of rectangular platforms arranged around the perimeter. Some have as many as sixteen platforms. The earliest examples date to between 300 and 100 BCE.
This civilization also participated in the shaft tomb tradition, a burial practice unique to western Mexico. Between roughly 500 BCE and 600 CE, people in Jalisco, Colima, and Nayarit buried their dead in underground chambers accessed through cylindrical shafts dug into the earth, sometimes fitted with stairs carved from volcanic rock. The tombs contained elaborate offerings: polished clay vessels in sienna tones, hollow figurines of humans and animals, obsidian tools, whistles, ceramic ocarinas, and bone percussion instruments. Archaeologists have also recovered skeletons of Mexican hairless dogs placed alongside human remains, believed to serve as guides in the afterlife.
These circular pyramids and underground tombs have no parallel in either Aztec or Maya architecture. They represent a completely independent cultural tradition.
Some Outside Influence, but Not Aztec Control
That said, Jalisco was not totally isolated from the rest of Mesoamerica. The archaeological site of Ixtépete, near Guadalajara, shows that its earliest inhabitants followed the shaft tomb tradition, but later phases incorporated architectural elements associated with Teotihuacán, the massive city-state that dominated central Mexico centuries before the Aztecs rose to power. These borrowed features included sloped-and-paneled construction, temple complexes arranged around patios, and stylized representations of the feathered serpent. This points to trade and cultural exchange with central Mexico during the Classic period (roughly 200 to 600 CE), not Aztec conquest.
A Fierce History of Independence
If anything, Jalisco’s indigenous peoples were defined by their resistance to outside control. When the Spanish conquistador Nuño de Guzmán arrived in the 1530s, the Caxcanes refused to provide labor for building his settlements and retreated into the hills. The abuse of the colonial labor system eventually triggered a massive uprising known as the Mixtón War. A Caxcan leader named Tenamaxtle, from the town of Nochistlán, assembled a coalition of 60,000 indigenous soldiers and marched south to threaten Guadalajara.
The famous conquistador Pedro de Alvarado, fresh from campaigns in Guatemala, led a reckless assault against the Caxcan stronghold at Nochistlán in June 1541. The indigenous resistance was so fierce that Alvarado’s forces were routed. During the chaotic retreat, Alvarado was crushed beneath a horse and died of his injuries days later in Guadalajara. The ongoing hostility of the local population eventually forced the Spanish to relocate Guadalajara nearly 60 miles to the south, a point of pride for people in the Nochistlán area to this day.
Jalisco’s Indigenous Legacy Today
Most of the groups that inhabited Jalisco at the time of Spanish contact were devastated by colonization, and their languages disappeared. The major surviving indigenous group is the Wixárika (Huichol), who continue to live in northwestern Jalisco and the neighboring states of Nayarit, Zacatecas, and Durango, as well as in cities like Guadalajara and Zapopan. The Wixárika maintain distinct cultural and spiritual traditions that predate European arrival and have no meaningful connection to either Aztec or Maya heritage.
Jalisco’s pre-Hispanic identity belongs to its own web of cultures: the circular-pyramid builders of Teuchitlán, the Chichimeca warriors of the highlands, the Coca farmers of the lake country, and the Wixárika communities that endure today. Grouping the region under the Aztec or Maya label erases a rich, independent history that most of the world has simply never heard of.