Northern New Mexico

The five largest cities in northern New Mexico are: Santa Fe, Las Vegas, Española, Los Alamos, and Taos.

The traditional southern boundary of the area is an escarpment called La Bajada southwest of Santa Fe.

The map in Cobos (1983) is a guide: from La Bajada the boundary runs northwest about 50 miles (80 km) west of U.S.

While northern New Mexico, also known as the río arriba or upper river area, did receive a lot of Hispanic settlement, much Hispanic colonial settlement also occurred in southern areas, known as the río abajo or lower river.

[3] Under that schema, the north central region includes the core part of cultural northern New Mexico.

Northern New Mexico
Blue hatched area shows approximate region culturally known as northern New Mexico
Blue hatched area shows region called Northern New Mexico in New Mexico state documents