Motul

History

Motul's name comes from the Maya Mutul. Tradition credits its founding to a Maya priest named Zac Mutul in the eleventh century. The town was later abandoned after an attack led by Kak U Pacal, and long afterward Noh Cabá Pech, a close relative of the lord of Mayapán, arrived and founded the chiefdom of Ceh Pech. The Pech family ruled this regional kingdom, with Motul as its capital, until the Spanish conquest in the sixteenth century.

After the conquest Motul was granted in encomienda to the conquistador Francisco de Bracamonte, who wrote in his account of Motul that the town might be as old as Izamal and Mayapán. The colonial town grew over the pre-Columbian ceremonial center, and a Franciscan monastery was built there. Motul received the rank of city on February 22, 1872.

Motul lies at the center of Yucatán's henequen zone, and important henequen processing plants operated in the city in the days of Cordemex, the state-owned company that ran the industry in the late twentieth century. Its most famous son, Felipe Carrillo Puerto, was governor of Yucatán and is remembered for his fight against the exploitation of the Maya people. After he was assassinated in 1924, the state congress added his name to the city's. Motul was named a Pueblo Mágico on June 26, 2023.