Sacapulas

Sacapulas
Municipality
The Municipal building in Sacapulas
Sacapulas Location in Guatemala
Coordinates: 15°17′21″N 91°5′21″W / 15.28917°N 91.08917°W / 15.28917; -91.08917Coordinates: 15°17′21″N 91°5′21″W / 15.28917°N 91.08917°W / 15.28917; -91.08917
Country	Guatemala
Department	El Quiché
Municipality	Sacapulas
Government
• Type	Municipal
• Mayor (2016-2020)	Nery Raúl Quintana Ortiz (UNE)
Elevation	3,900 ft (1,200 m)
Population (Census 2002)
• Municipality	35,706
• Urban	8,148
• Ethnicities	Sakapultek, K'iche', Ladino
• Religions	Roman Catholicism, Evangelicalism, Maya
Climate	Am

Sacapulas is a municipality in the Guatemalan department of El Quiché.

Worried about the defection of the aj K’ub’ul family chief -who had taken his family away in order to look for fertile and, above all, pacific land-, the K’iche’ king sent a group of soldiers to control every single movement of them. He was afraid that the aj K'ub'ul would look for reinforcements from other ethnic group in the area to form a strong army and then attack the k'iche's. The warriors settled to the east of the aj K’ub’ul and since the latter had moved away to look for peace and tranquility, they were a very peaceful community. And that is exactcly wha the warriors inform the K’iche’ king, reassuring him by telling that he should not worry about the exiled group, as they were really peaceful.

As time went by, the k'iche' warriors realized that the aj K'ub'ul life was very different from the one they were used to have under the ruling of their king, as they simple worked on their land and crops and then enjoyed their families without having to worry about being invaded or called to fight in a war. Therefore, they went back to their place of origin, Tujalj (Sacapulas and Canillá)), but only to pick up their families and went on to settle a new community where they were once stationed to keep an eye on the aj K'ub'ul.

In the ten years after the fall of Zaculeu various Spanish expeditions crossed into the Sierra de los Cuchumatanes and engaged in the gradual and complex conquest of the Chuj and Q'anjob'al. The Spanish were attracted to the region in the hope of extracting gold, silver and other riches from the mountains but their remoteness, the difficult terrain and relatively low population made their conquest and exploitation extremely difficult. The population of the Cuchumatanes is estimated to have been 260,000 before European contact. By the time the Spanish physically arrived in the region this had collapsed to 150,000 because of the effects of the Old World diseases that had run ahead of them.

After the western portion of the Cuchumatanes fell to the Spanish, the Ixil and Uspantek Maya were sufficiently isolated to evade immediate Spanish attention. The Uspantek and the Ixil were allies and in 1529, four years after the conquest of Huehuetenango, Uspantek warriors were harassing Spanish forces and Uspantán was trying to foment rebellion among the K'iche'. Uspantek activity became sufficiently troublesome that the Spanish decided that military action was necessary. Gaspar Arias, magistrate of Guatemala, penetrated the eastern Cuchumatanes with sixty Spanish infantry and three hundred allied indigenous warriors. By early September he had imposed temporary Spanish authority over the Ixil towns of Chajul and Nebaj. The Spanish army then marched east toward Uspantán itself; Arias then received notice that the acting governor of Guatemala, Francisco de Orduña, had deposed him as magistrate. Arias handed command over to the inexperienced Pedro de Olmos and returned to confront de Orduña. Although his officers advised against it, Olmos launched a disastrous full-scale frontal assault on the city. As soon as the Spanish began their assault they were ambushed from the rear by more than two thousand Uspantek warriors. The Spanish forces were routed with heavy losses; many of their indigenous allies were slain, and many more were captured alive by the Uspantek warriors only to be sacrificed on the altar of their deity Exbalamquen. The survivors who managed to evade capture fought their way back to the Spanish garrison at Q'umarkaj.