Before this, my second trip to Guatemala, I didn’t even know that there were highland Mayan kingdoms. I had believed that to see remnants of the Mayan people, one had to journey to the jungles in Guatemala’s north, to the lowland cities of Tikal, Yaxha, and the other classical Mayan city-states in the region. But here, just an hour and a half from Antigua Guatemala, in the mountains of Guatemala’s highlands, is another Mayan capital.

In roughly the year 900 CE, Tikal and the other lowland city-states, those mega Mayan cities, were abandoned, for reasons still not totally known. Remnants from those kingdoms left the area, but where did they go? While there were classical (and even pre-classical) Mayan cities in the highlands, none were very large. But in post-classical times, leading up to the Spanish conquest of Guatemala in the 1520s, a couple of highland Mayan kingdoms were significantly larger. It is probable that survivors of the lowland abandonment ultimately ended up here, although where various peoples migrated is unknown.

What we do know is this: at the time of Spanish arrival in the area, two major Mayan kingdoms existed in the highlands (and several other more minor ones): the Kakchiquel and the Kiche. So that is where our Mayan story picks up, roughly 500 years after the lowland city-states were abandoned.

For centuries, the Kiche and the Kakchiquel were close allies, two different peoples with distinct languages living together. But around 1470, the Kakchiquel moved out, founding a new capital city of their own. This city grew quickly, as did the entire kingdom, and by the time the Spanish arrived, the Kakchiquel were roughly equal to their former partners in power. Their capital at Iximche (pronounced Ish-im-chay) was home to about 50,000 people, which while much smaller than the megacities of the lowlands during the classical period, was very large for this post-classical era.

When the Spanish invaded Guatemala after their conquest of the Aztecs in Mexico, an invasion led by Pedro de Alvarado who is perhaps best known for slaughtering the Aztec nobility, the Kiche were targeted first. But by the mid-1520s, resistance was mainly the Kakchiquel. In 1524, Iximche fell, though the population left and went into the mountains to launch guerilla attacks. The Spanish built their first regional capital on top of the Mayan city, then left a few years later as a result of uprisings, burning Iximche behind them.

Today, the ruins of Iximche can be fairly easily visited as a day trip from Antigua Guatemala or from Lake Atitlan. And while the city lacks the size and scope of the lowland ruins from centuries earlier, some context is important.

First, the population here was much smaller. Second, construction at Iximche was all within a 50 year period, as it was only 54 years from founding to being conquered. (By contrast, Tikal’s mighty temples and pyramids took more than a century each to build, with a population at least 3-5 times as large.) Finally, as with classical cities, Iximche was built by hand, with no beasts of burden, no metal tools, and no wheels. So given all these things, it is a truly remarkable work of engineering.

Iximche contained (it is thought) six plazas, three of which have been fully excavated, running in a largely straight line from northwest to southeast. Plaza A, the largest, hosts twin temples facing each other in the Mayan style, along with a fully excavated ball court along one side.

Plaza B hosts remains of the kingdom’s royal palace, and Plaza C today contains some more modern Christian shrines built into the remains of a single central structure.

Construction at Iximche differs from a city like Tikal in a few ways. First is the size, as Iximche was a smaller city, and temples here were built shorter (perhaps due to earthquakes, perhaps due to resources). Tikal and the other lowland cities are built of limestone; Iximche is hard stone and mortar. And the classical cities were built with huge artistic and ceremonial adornments, while Iximche is more simple and holds little that doesn’t have a functional purpose.

Though the Spanish conquered Iximche, putting an “official” end to the Mayan highland kingdoms, in 1524, resistance would continue for more than a century from holdouts in the mountains. And today, roughly 50% of Guatemalans can claim at least partial ancestry to those post-classical Mayan kingdoms. But in some small pockets of the country, Mayan culture is still alive – and thriving!

The city of Chichicastenango is about an hour from Lake Atitlan, but is also reachable from Antigua. Best known for its huge market on Thursdays and Sundays, Chichi, as it is called, is one of the centerpieces of modern Mayan life in Guatemala. You see, the highland Mayans were not really ever fully conquered. Rather, resistance died out by the end of the 17th century (though there would be rekindled conflict as part of the Guatemalan Civil War of 1960-96 and a genocide against the Mayan communities) as the Mayans converted to Catholicism. But their languages were not eradicated, and as we can see from Chichi, many of their customs were folded into Catholic practice.

The Church of Santo Tomas sits on one side of the maze of streets and alleys that become the Thursday (in my case) market, its facade gleaming white over sellers of ceremonial flowers on the stairs leading to the entrance. It would seem like any other Guatemalan Catholic church. But inside, statues of saints (Tomas is the patron here) are dressed in Mayan colorful attire. Offerings are made in flowers and the burning of candles and spices (in Mayan blends), and religious art includes Mayan mythology. (I see one piece that includes Jesus, as well as a pair of mer-men from a Mayan tale of men who become fish.)

Note: photography inside the church is not permitted, but after explaining that I am writing about these customs, I am allowed to take a photo of one of the saints, specially Tomas, for illustrative purposes.

I am told that today’s Mayan community is fully Catholic, but hasn’t been able or willing to give up the ceremonial aspects of millennia-old traditions. Rather, with a sort of smile and nod (rather than tacit approval) of the Church, those have been folded in. Ceremonial burnings of candles and incense that would have been made to Mayan deities are instead dedicated to Jesus and Mary. Mayan healers also use Catholic prayers with traditional Mayan ingredients (like an egg being rubbed on those suffering from being broken or sick). I am not quite sure how the mythological stories play together, but I would guess they are chalked up to being miracles of Jesus or God rather than Mayan deities.

At the other side of Chichi’s market lies the most colorful cemetery I’ve ever visited. Again, we have Catholic burial rights sitting side by side with Mayan love of color, and Mayan offerings. Various monuments have places on them for burning the aforementioned candles and spices.

And walk out the other side of that cemetery and one finds pure Mayan ritual, although the statues are inspirational rather than depictions of gods, and prayers over the bonfires are made to God, Jesus, and Mary. It is a fascinating mix of cultures.

While other pre-colonial cultures in the Americas were totally extinguished from linguistic and ceremonial perspectives, here in the Guatemalan highlands, the age of the Mayans lives on. From ruins of their last capital at Iximche to the centerpiece of their modern hybrid culture at Chichicastenango, visitors can truly experience close to a thousand years of post-classical Mayan history and culture, and see the form it takes here in the 21st century. It is a trip worth taking, and a story worth learning.

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