generation of men, since the beginning of civilization and of the population, the beginning of the existence of the nation.
There, then, they built many houses and at the same time constructed the temple of God; in the center of the high part of the town they located it when they arrived and settled there.
Then their empire grew. They were very numerous,[362] when they held their council in their great houses. They reunited, but later divided, because dissensions had arisen and jealousies grew up amongst them over the price for their sisters and their daughters, and because they no longer drank together.[363]
This, then, was the reason why they divided and why they turned against each other, and they threw the skulls of the dead, they hurled them around among each other.
Then they divided into nine families, and having ended the dispute over the sisters and the daughters, they carried out the plan of dividing the kingdom into twenty-four great houses, as they did. It is a long time since they came here to their town, and finished the twenty-four great houses, there in the City of Gumarcaah, which was blessed by the Bishop. Later the city was abandoned.[364]
There they increased, there they installed their splendid thrones and royal seats, and they distributed their honors among all the lords. The nine lords of Cavec formed nine families; the lords of Nihaib formed another nine; the lords of Ahau-Quiché formed another four; and the lords of Zaquic formed another two families.
They became very numerous, and many also followed each of the lords; these were the first among their vassals, and each of the lords had large families.[365]
We shall tell now the names of the lords of each of the great houses. Here, then, are the names of the lords of Cavec. The first of the lords was Ahpop,[366] [then] Ahpop-Camhá,[367] Ah-Tohil,[368] Ah-Gucumatz,[369] Nim-Chocoh-Cavec,[370] Popol-Vinac-Chituy,[371] Lolmet-Quehnay,[372] Popol-Vinac Pa-Hom Tzalatz,[373] and Uchuch-Camhá.[374]
the lords. All of this building, on the side opposite the houses, was closed by a wall made of stone which was called tzalam-coxtum, a name given to all those buildings because, in addition to serving as a place for ceremonies, they were also castles and forts for defense against their enemies, and for this reason they were built on the hilltops.
Fuentes y Guzmán (Historia de Guatemala, Book VIII, Chap. X) describes the palaces of Utatlán with a wealth of detail and imagination, but does not give a clearer idea of the temple or place of worship, with the exception of information relative to the existence of "the fourth step," of a smooth stone of two and three-quarter yards (2.50 meters) and five feet wide (more or less, 1.50 meters), on which dismal and unhappy place they sacrificed the men, and "with a wide knife of chay [obsidian] they opened the breast [of the victim] and tore out the beating heart to offer it to the god."
[362] E qui chic e pu tzatz.
[363] Rumal xa mavi chi tzacon c'uquiya chi qui vach, in the original. They no longer gathered to eat and drink as they did in Izmachí when they arranged the weddings of their daughters and sons.
[364] Don Francisco Marroquín, the first Bishop of Guatemala, who arrived in the country in 1530 and governed the diocese until his death in 1563. The historian Ximénez (Historia de ... Chiapa y Guatemala, I, 115) fixes the time of the blessing of the new Spanish city which was substituted for the ancient capital, saying that the Bishop gave it the name of Santa Cruz of the Quiché "when, in the year 1539, he was in that Court, and blessing the place, fixed and raised the standard of the Faith." The site of Utatlán was abandoned when the city was moved to the plains near by, where it is today still located and serves as the capital of the department of the Quiché.
[365] Tzatz, tzatz.
[366] The king.
[367] The assistant to the monarch, the one designated to succeed him.
[368] The priest of Tohil.
[369] The priest of Gucumatz.
Please email us if you are interested
in a PDF of any of the posted books.