Lacandon people

Lacandon

Hach Winik
Photograph of Lacandons published by Teoberto Maler in 1901
Total population
(Mexico: approx 1,000)
Regions with significant populations
Mexico (Lacandon Jungle in Northeastern Chiapas) and Petén, Guatemala
Languages
Lacandón, Spanish, some words in other Mayan Languages (Ch'ol, Tzeltal)
Religion
Protestant, traditional belief system, some Catholic influences
Related ethnic groups
Maya peoples

The Lacandon are one of the Maya peoples who live in the jungles of the Mexican state of Chiapas, near the southern border with Guatemala. Their homeland, the Lacandon Jungle, lies along the Mexican side of the Usumacinta River and its tributaries. The Lacandon are one of the most isolated and culturally conservative of Mexico's native peoples. Almost extinct in 1943, today their population has grown significantly, yet remains small, at approximately 650 speakers of the Lacandon language.

The Lacandon escaped Spanish control throughout the colonial era by living in small, remote farming communities in the jungles of what is now Chiapas and the Guatemalan department of El Petén, avoiding contact with whites and Ladinos. Lacandon customs remain close to those of their pre-Columbian Mesoamerican ancestors. As recently as the late 19th century some bound the heads of infants, resulting in the distinctively shaped foreheads seen in Classic Maya art. And well into the 20th century, they continued using bows and arrows and making arrowheads from flint they quarried in the rainforest. Today they sell versions of these to tourists.

Until the mid-20th century the Lacandon had little contact with the outside world. They worshiped their own pantheon of gods and goddesses in small huts set aside for religious worship at the edge of their villages. These sacred structures contain a shelf of clay incense burners, each decorated with the face of a Lacandon deity. The Lacandon also made pilgrimages to ancient Maya cities to pray and to remove stone pebbles from the ruins for ritual purposes. They believe that the Maya sites are places where their gods once dwelled before moving to new domains they constructed in the sky and below the earth. The Maya site of Bonampak, famous for its preserved temple murals, became known to the outside world when Lacandóns led American photographer Giles Healy there in 1946.