The Tiwa or Tigua are a group of related Tanoan Puebloans in New Mexico. They traditionally spoke a Tiwa language (although some speakers have switched to Spanish and/or English), and are divided into the two Northern Tiwa groups, in Taos and Picuris, and the Southern Tiwa in Isleta and Sandia, around what is now Albuquerque, and in Ysleta del Sur near El Paso, Texas.
Tiwa is the English name for these peoples, which is derived from the Spanish term Tigua and put into use by Frederick Webb Hodge. The Spanish term has also been used in English writings although the term Tiwa now is dominant.
In Spanish Tigua only was applied to the Southern Tiwa groups (in Tiguex territory). Spanish variants of Tigua include Cheguas, Chiguas, Téoas, Tiguas, Tigües, Tiguesh, Tigüex, Tiguex, Tigüez, Tihuex, Tioas, Tziquis. The names Atzigues, Atziqui, Tihues, and Tziquis were originally applied to the Piro but later writers confused these terms for the Piro with the terms for the Southern Tiwa. A further confusion is with some of the terms for the Tewa (Tegua, Tehuas, Teoas) being applied to both the Tewa and (Southern) Tiwa indiscriminately. The forms Tiguesh, Tigüex, and Tiguex are meant to represent a pronunciation of [tiweʃ] which the supposedly an Isletan term meaning "Isletan" according to Adolph Francis Alphonse Bandelier. The term Tiguan is usually given instead Bandelier's Tigüex — this being a representation of the Isletan term for "Southern Tiwas" and recorded in modern times as Tíwan with the term Tiwáde for the singular "(a) Southern Tiwa" (J. P. Harrington recorded the singular as Tiwa and said that Tiwa/Tiwan could also be used to refer to Northern Tiwas).