Tzitacuaro

Zitácuaro lies in the mountains of eastern Michoacán, on routes between the Mexican central highlands and the Purépecha country. During the struggle for independence it became the seat of a governing body intended to unite insurgent forces scattered across New Spain. The town’s mountain setting offered a base from which the leaders sought to give the rebellion a common direction.

After Miguel Hidalgo and other leaders were captured and executed in 1811, Ignacio López Rayón called an assembly at Zitácuaro. In August it established the Supreme National American Junta, initially composed of three members and exercising authority in the name of Ferdinand VII. Royalist forces attacked the town at the beginning of 1812, forcing the insurgents to leave. Though its authority was contested and its seat short-lived, the junta was an important attempt to organize government amid the war.