Nahuas

Nahuas

Nahua children in traditional clothes
Total population
2,694,189+
Regions with significant populations
Mexico Oaxaca, Morelos, Puebla, Hidalgo, Michoacán, Veracruz, Jalisco, Estado de México, Mexico City, Tlaxcala, Chihuahua, Durango, San Luis Potosi and Guerrero El Salvador Ahuachapan, Sonsonate, San Salvador, Santa Ana Nicaragua Rivas, Chinandega, Nueva Segovia, Matagalpa, Jinotega
Languages
Nahuatl, Nawat and Spanish
Religion
Christianity (Predominantly Roman Catholic with pre-colombia influence), Aztec religion
Related ethnic groups
Pipil, Nicarao, Mexicaneros, Indigenous people of the Americas and Mestizo, Mexica, Tlaxcallans

The Nahuas (/ˈnɑːwɑːz/ NAH-wahz^[1]) are a group of the Indigenous people of Mexico, with Nahua minorities also in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.^{[2][3][4][5][6][7]} They comprise the largest indigenous group in Mexico.^[8][9] They are a Mesoamerican ethnicity. The Mexica (Aztecs) are of Nahua ethnicity, as are their historical enemies, the Tlaxcallans (Tlaxcaltecs). The Toltecs which predated both groups are often thought to have been Nahua as well. However, in the pre-Columbian period Nahuas were subdivided into many groups that did not necessarily share a common identity.

Their Nahuan languages, or Nahuatl, consist of many variants, several of which are mutually unintelligible. About 1.5 million Nahuas speak Nahuatl and another million speak only Spanish. Fewer than 1,000 native speakers of Nahuatl remain in El Salvador.^[10]

It is suggested that the Nahua peoples originated near Aridoamerica, in regions of the present day Mexican states of Durango and Nayarit or the Bajío region. They split off from the other Uto-Aztecan speaking peoples and migrated into central Mexico around 500 CE. The Nahua then settled in and around the Basin of Mexico and spread out to become the dominant people in central Mexico. However, Nahuatl-speaking populations were present in smaller populations throughout Mesoamerica.