Valladolid

History

Valladolid was founded on May 28, 1543, by the Spanish conquistador Francisco de Montejo to control a region then ruled by the Cupul Maya, and it was named after the Spanish city. The first site, at a place called Chauac-Há, proved unhealthy, and on March 24, 1545, the settlers moved it to Zací, the Cupul capital, whose name means white hawk. Stones from the Maya buildings went into the new town. Franciscans built the convent of San Bernardino between 1552 and 1560, and through the colonial period Valladolid was the main center of eastern Yucatán.

After independence the city was home, from 1833 to 1847, to a steam-powered thread and textile factory called La Aurora de la Industria Yucateca. Then came the Caste War. Maya rebels led by Cecilio Chi besieged Valladolid and took it in March 1848; the non-Maya population fled, and government troops recovered the city months later.

On June 4, 1910, an uprising against the Porfirio Díaz regime broke out here, months before the Mexican Revolution began in the north. It is remembered in Yucatán as the first spark of the Revolution. Long nicknamed the Sultana of the East, Valladolid became a Pueblo Mágico in 2012.