Coyoacán

Coyoacán (US: /ˌkɔɪoʊəˈkɑːn/ KOY-oh-ə-KAHN; Spanish: [koʝoaˈkan] ^ⓘ, Otomi: Ndemiñ'yo) is a borough (demarcación territorial) in Mexico City. The former village is now the borough's "historic center". The name comes from Nahuatl and most likely means "place of coyotes", when the Aztecs named a pre-Hispanic village on the southern shore of Lake Texcoco dominated by the Tepanec people. Against Aztec domination, these people allied with the Spanish, who used the area as a headquarters during the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire and made it the first capital of New Spain between 1521 and 1523.

The village and later municipality of Coyoacán remained independent of Mexico City through the colonial period into the 19th century. In 1857, the area was incorporated into the then Federal District when this district was expanded. In 1928, the borough was created when the Federal District was divided into sixteen boroughs. The urban expansion of Mexico City reached the borough in the mid-20th century, turning farms, former lakes, and forests into developed areas, but many of the former villages have kept their original layouts, plazas, and narrow streets and have conserved structures built from the 16th to the early 20th centuries. This has made the borough of Coyoacán, especially its historic center, a popular place to visit on weekends.