After the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, Cortes passed through here a second time sometime later to visit mines in Pachuca. The Spanish divided Otumba into among a number of encomiendas, many of which belonged to Cortes himself. When Cortes went to Spain in 1528, the Otumba area was seized by Nuño de Guzmán who declared it a province of the crown, along with a number of other areas. When Cortes returned, he retook Otumba and installed his son Martín Cortés as tribute collector.