This article presents the paleographic transcription, analysis and preliminary study of the 1654 indigenous census of Casabindo and Cochinoca reduction towns. Their inhabitants settled in the southwestern part of the Andean Puna, where cattle raising and mining were predominant, while agriculture was poorly developed. The area, which is now part of the province of Jujuy in the extreme northwest of Argentina, belonged to the Gobernación del Tucumán in 1654. This document is the earliest known census of these reduction towns, and it is unusual in that it includes the indigenous names (not only men but also women and children). In this preliminary study we present a detailed summary of the history of those people, highlighting their remarkable degree of integration with other inhabitants of the region, their long resistance to Spanish rule, and the continuity of their indigenous authorities. A quantitative synthesis of the registered tax units allows us to reconstruct the population movements and its main trends.