Tonal

The Tonal religion covers the Mesoamerican peoples outside the Nahua and Maya cults, chiefly the Purépecha of Michoacán and the Mixtecs and Zapotecs of Oaxaca. Each people had its own gods. The Purépecha worshipped Curicaueri, the Great Fire, god of fire and the sun and patron of their ruling Uacúsecha clan, who in a vision sent Tariácuri to unite the Pátzcuaro basin. The Zapotecs honoured Cocijo, god of lightning and rain, and their high priest, the Uija-tao, lived at Mitla, a sanctuary of the dead. The Mixtecs prayed to the rain god Dzahui and kept royal genealogies in painted codices such as the Zouche-Nuttall.

The Mixtecs and Zapotecs submitted to Spain in 1521–1522, and in 1530 the Purépecha king Tangaxuan II was executed. In 1553 the Church ordered the temples of Mitla dismantled.