War of the Castes

Caste War of Yucatán

Mayan territory, circa 1870.

Date	1847-1901 (skirmishes continued until 1933)
Location	Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico
Result	1847–1883: Mayan victory, State of Chan Santa Cruz established. 1884–1901: Mexican victory, Mexico recaptures the Yucatan.

Belligerents

Mayan State of Chan Santa Cruz

Maya people

Mexico

Republic of Yucatan (1847-1848)

The war was declared over several times though hostile conflict between the Mexicans and Mayans continued until 1933.

Mayan State of Chan Santa Cruz

The Caste War of Yucatán (1847–1901) began with the revolt of native Maya people of Yucatán, Mexico against the European-descended population, called Yucatecos. The latter had long held political and economic control of the region. A lengthy war ensued between the Yucateco forces in the north-west of the Yucatán and the independent Maya in the south-east. There was regular raiding between them.

In the 1850s the United Kingdom recognized the Maya state because of the value of its trading with British Honduras (present-day Belize). In addition, by 1867 the Maya occupied parts of the western part of the Yucatán, including the District of Petén, where the Xloschá and Macanché tribes were allied with them. With growing investment in Mexico, in 1893 the United Kingdom signed a new treaty with the national government, recognizing its control of all of the Yucatán, formalizing the border with British Honduras, and closing its colony to trade with Chan Santa Cruz.

The war officially ended in 1901 when the Mexican army occupied the Maya capital of Chan Santa Cruz and subdued neighboring areas. Another formal end was made in 1915, when a Mexican general was sent to subdue the territory. He introduced reforms from the revolution that ended some of the grievances. However, skirmishes with small settlements that refused to acknowledge Mexican control continued until 1933, and non-Maya were at risk of being killed if they ventured into the jungle.

In Spanish colonial times, the Yucatán (like most of New Spain) population operated under a legal caste system: peninsulares (officials born in Spain) were at the top, the criollos of Spanish descent in the next level, followed by the mestizo population (of mixed European-Amerindian descent), then descendants of the natives who had collaborated with the Spanish conquest of Yucatán, and at the bottom were the other native indios.

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