The Purépecha (Western Highland Purepecha: P'urhepecha [pʰuˈɽepet͡ʃa]) are a group of Indigenous people centered in the northwestern region of Michoacán, Mexico, mainly in the area of the cities of Cherán and Pátzcuaro.

However, many avoided conquest and bloodshed and, in order to maintain their freedom, exchanged goods and resources such as metal with the Purépecha kingdom.

This was most likely due to the presence of metal ores within their empire, and their knowledge of metallurgy, which was far superior to that of the Aztecs [1][failed verification]; such skills have persisted in their descendants and are still widely regarded today, particularly their coppersmithing.

After hearing of the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire and having the native population much diminished by an epidemic of smallpox, the cazonci Tangaxuan II pledged his allegiance as a vassal of the King of Spain without a fight in 1525.

It is believed that the Spanish conquistador Cristóbal de Olid, upon arriving in the Purépecha Empire, now in present-day Michoacán, explored some parts of Guanajuato in the early 1520s.

In 1530, the president of the Real Audiencia, Nuño de Guzmán, a conquistador notorious for his ruthlessness and brutality towards the natives, plundered the region and executed Tangaxuan II, destroying the Purépecha State and provoking a chaotic situation and widespread violence.

In 1533, the Crown sent an experienced Oidor (Judge of the Audiencia) and later bishop, Don Vasco de Quiroga, who established a lasting colonial rule.

When former revolutionary general Lázaro Cárdenas, originally from a small town in Michoacán, was appointed governor of his state, he began an ambitious program of reform and economic development, which he continued when he became president of Mexico (1934–40).

Although the Aztecs loomed large in Mexican history and the construction of identity, Cárdenas saw the Purépecha as "purer" source.

[4] He named the house he built in Pátzcuaro "La Quinta Eréndira" and commissioned muralists to depict Purépecha history in his residence and elsewhere.

[6] In the late twentieth and early twenty-first century social scientists have studied Purépecha emigration from the region.

One distinctive practice of the Purépecha include the baptism of newborns after forty days of separate rest for the mother and child.

[14] The 2022 film, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, introduces Namor, whose mythos is rewritten to include an indigenous Meso American background with influences from Mayan and Aztec culture.