Küicheü (pronounced ; previous Spanish spelling: ) are Indigenous peoples of the Americas and are one of the Maya peoples. The eponymous Küicheü language is a Mesoamerican language in the Mayan language family. The highland Küicheü states in the pre-Columbian era are associated with the ancient Maya civilization, and reached the peak of their power and influence during the Mayan Postclassic period (âÂÂ1539 AD).
The meaning of the word in the Küicheü language is "many trees". The Nahuatl translation, "Place of the Many Trees (People)", is the origin of the word Guatemala. Quiché Department is also named after them. Rigoberta Menchú Tum, an activist for Indigenous rights who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992, is perhaps the best-known Küicheü person.
According to the 2018 census, Küicheü people constituted 11% of the Guatemalan population, accounting for 1,610,551 people out of a total of 14,901,286 people. The large majority of Küicheü people live in the western highlands of Guatemala, a region roughly corresponding to the former state of Los Altos. In Guatemala, they primarily live in the departments of Totonicapán (97% Küicheü), El Quiché (60% Küicheü), Quetzaltenango (28% Küicheü), Sololá (43% Küicheü), and Suchitepéquez (26% Küicheü).
El Quiché forms the heartland of the Küicheü people. In pre-Columbian times, the Küicheü settlements and influence reached beyond the highlands, including the valley of Antigua and coastal areas in Escuintla.
Most Küicheü speak their native language and have at least a working knowledge of Spanish. Exceptions are in some remote and isolated rural communities, where the people speak only Küicheü. Maya languages closely related to Küicheü are Uspantek, Sakapultek, Kaqchikel and Tzutujil.
The history of the Küicheü people can be divided into two main historical periods, pre-conquest and post-conquest. Conquest occurred in 1524 with the arrival of the conquistador Pedro de Alvarado, who conducted war against this people.
In pre-Conquest times, the Küicheü Kingdom of Qüumarkaj was one of the most powerful states in the region. Küiche was an independent state that existed after the decline of the Maya Civilization with the Classic collapse (c.300 â c.950 AD). Küicheü lay in a highland mountain valley of present-day Guatemala; during this time they were also found in parts of El Salvador.
The major city of the Küicheü in the western highlands of Guatemala was Qüumarkaj. It was the political, ceremonial and social center of the Küicheü people. The city covered an estimated area of 3.25 km<sup>2</sup> across the Resguardo plateau. There is also evidence for a large degree of cultural exchange between the Küicheü and the people of Central Mexico. Linguists have found Nahuatl influences in the Küicheü language. Up until the 16th century before conquest K'iche were a literate civilization, creating glyphs and pictographs which helped preserve their culture.
The Küicheü were conquered by the conquistador Pedro de Alvarado in 1524. Their last military commander, Tecun Uman, led the Küicheü armies against the combined forces of Alvarado and his allies, the Kaqchikel. The battle took place in the valley of Xelajú (Quetzaltenango) where the Küicheü armies were defeated and close to 10,000 Küicheü died, including Tecún Umán. Tecún has since been an important legendary figure in the Küicheü oral tradition. After the battle, the Küicheü surrendered and invited Alvarado to their capital, Qüumarkaj. However, Alvarado suspected an ambush and had the city burned. The ruins of the city can still be seen, just a short distance from Santa Cruz del Quiché.
One of the main missions of the Spanish clergy during the conquest was to convert the Mesoamerican people to Catholic Christianity. Though they never fully converted the people, they did affect their language. The Küicheü people were one of the first groups studied by the Catholic missionary religious order known as the Dominicans. The Franciscans established Theologia Indorum, a Christian theology text written in the Küicheü native language and adapting K'iche' concepts to Catholicism. The text was meant to be a tool for converting the Küicheü and other Mesoamerican groups to Christianity. To accomplish this, the Dominicans attempted to change the meaning of some native words to better reflect their Catholic concepts. They also used similar word, sentence, and rhythmic structure to the Popol Vuh to create similarities between the texts.
In the early 1980s, the government of Guatemala, under the leadership of EfraÃÂn RÃÂos Montt, carried out a massive campaign to quell both the rebellions largely organized by the Mayan people and the spread of liberation ideas inspired by the Catholic church.àBecause the K'iche' are the largest Maya group within Guatemala, they became a major target of the counterinsurgency programs, which developed into what is now known as the Guatemalan genocide.àThe tactics of the Guatemalan army to fight the insurgency ranged from desecrating sacred symbols and burning crops, to raping Mayan women, mutilating and displaying Mayan bodies, and coercing Mayan men into Civil Defense Patrols.àAccording to the Guatemalan Historical Clarification Commission, Maya people in Southern ÃÂl Quiché were 98.4% of total victims.
Because of the disproportionate targeting of native peoples, the K'iche' people who inhabit Southern ÃÂl Quiché continue to be affected by the government's counterinsurgency programs.àHowever, scholars have pointed out the differences between Western ideas of trauma and the Mesoamerican understanding.àThe Guatemalan Historical Clarification Commission has emphasized the need for mental health solutions that highlight community development and human rights.àPrevious efforts to provide relief have included encouraging natives to provide testimonies on RÃÂos Montt's actions, reburying family members who were previously thrown in mass graves, and training community volunteers to accompany affected people and provide support.
Up until 2012, RÃÂos Montt served in Congress, which granted him immunity from prosecution. In 2013, RÃÂos Montt and his armed forces were charged with the massacres of 15 villages in the K'iche' area. RÃÂos Montt declared innocence throughout the trial, and was convicted for crimes against humanity and sentenced to 80 years in prison. RÃÂos Montt's conviction was overturned by Constitutional court due to lobbying by the country's business elite, issuing a retrial that was delayed when a judge recused herself. Eventually in 2017, the retrial began but since RÃÂos Montt was diagnosed with dementia, the trial was closed to the public, and RÃÂos Montt was not required to be there. He died in his home while the trial was ongoing, in April 2018.
The origin of the elite Küicheü rulers is debated but scholars widely believe that the warlords traveled to the Guatemalan highlands in AD 1225. They began their migration after the collapse of the Yucatàn Maya center of Chichén Itzá, which is believed to have taken place around AD 1200. The elite warlords followed the RÃÂo Usumacinta drainage, the RÃÂo Negro, and RÃÂo Agua Caliente until they crossed into the San Andres Basin, where they began early Küicheü settlements. These warlords were in small groups that were very mobile and consisted mostly of men. They began to intermingle with the local Küicheü populations soon after their arrival. A chronological list of the rulers can be made by using generation lengths from the first ruler and so on.
Declared Guatemala's national hero in 1960, Tecun Uman was the last of the K'iche' rulers. His death on February 20, 1524 is memorialized each year by the Guatemalan people. This is done, in part, through the Dance of the Conquest, which tells the story of the natives' conversion to Christianity following the Spanish Conquest. K'iche' documents, such as the TÃÂtulo Xecul, detail his immense wealth, stating that he wore quetzal feathers, rare gems, and abundant jewelry.
Some scholars doubt the existence of Tecun Uman as a historical figure, citing stories of the leader flying as a quetzal or an eagle in K'iche' stories.ÃÂ Other scholars claim that, instead, Tecun Uman's legacy is the result of a mythologized version of a historical figure.
Rigoberta Menchú Tum is an Indigenous rights activist who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992.àAs a young woman, Menchu began advocating for the women's rights movement through the Catholic Church in Guatemala.àShe later joined the Committee for Peasant Unity (CUC) along with her father to advocate for better labor conditions for farmers. During the rule of General Efrain Rios Montt, Menchú protested the government's counterinsurgency programs with her family, claiming that they were the result of cultural and socioeconomic tensions. After her father, mother, and brother were murdered by the Guatemalan government for their involvement in these protests, Menchú fled to Mexico. While in exile, she published her autobiography, which highlighted the Guatemalan Civil War and the violence committed against her family and the K'iche' people.
In 1996, Rigoberta Menchu became a UN Ambassador for the world's Indigenous peoples and helped promote the first International Decade of the World's Indigenous People. Since then, she has run for President of Guatemala in both 2007 and 2011 as a member of the left-leaning Winaq party but lost both elections by a large majority.
Luis Enrique Sam Colop is a K'iche'an writer who is most known for his accomplishment in translating the Popol Vuh from K'iche' into modern Spanish while bringing back the original poetry element. Sam was born a native K'iche' speaker and also learned Spanish. He attended Rafael Landivar University in Guatemala, graduating with a degree in law. He holds a doctorate in English from the State University of New York with a dissertation on Mayan poetry. For his work on the Popol Vuh, he received a grant from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation for advanced professionals.
MarÃÂa Telón is a film and stage actress. She made her debut in the film Ixcanul in 2015, receiving the Best Actress award at the Bratislava International Film Festival and other international film festivals. Telón also appeared in Marvel's ', playing an elderly Maya woman.
Irma Alicia Velásquez Nimatuj is a renowned anthropologist and university professor who became the first Guatemalan indigenous woman to earn a PhD. In 2002, she filed the first racial discrimination complaint after being refused entry to a tavern in Guatemala City because she was wearing a regional clothing, which sparked a political debate on racial discrimination that culminated in the criminalisation of racial discrimination. Subsequently, she has been an advisor to UN Women in Latin America and the Caribbean and has been a witness Tribunal of Conscience against Sexual Violence against Women during the Armed Conflict.
One of the most significant surviving Mesoamerican literary documents and primary sources of knowledge about Maya societal traditions, beliefs and mythology is a product of the 16th-century Küicheü people. This document, known as the Popol Vuh ("Pop wuj" in proper Küiche â "the book of events") and originally written around the 1550s, contains a compilation of mythological and ethno-historical narratives known to these people at that time. These were drawn from earlier pre-Columbian sources (now lost) and also oral traditions. This sacred narrative includes their creation myth, relating how the world and humans were created by the gods, the story of the divine brothers, and the history of the Küicheü from their migration into their homeland up to the Spanish conquest.
The Popol Vuh, from its creation to present day, has developed as an important symbol of Indigenous culture for both present-day Guatemalans and people of Mayan descent. This sacred text has been used in religious and spiritual ceremonies, university studies, political movements and protests, and historical research into the lives of the Mayans and, more specifically, the Küicheü people. In 1971 it was declared the official book of Guatemala. The Popol Vuh has been used by people of Mayan descent in present-day Guatemala to defend their traditional lands and political rights in order to preserve their Indigenous culture. To this day, the Popol Vuh continues to be analyzed and studied to better understand the spiritual beliefs and practices of the Maya, and how these have shaped present-day cultures.