Maya is a modern collective term for the. Today they inhabit southern mexico guatemala belize el salvador and honduras. The maya peoples ˈ m aɪ ə are an ethnolinguistic group of indigenous peoples of mesoamerica the ancient maya civilization was formed by members of this group and today s maya are generally descended from people who lived within that historical civilization.
Francisco de montejo undertook the conquest of this region in 1526 but because of determined maya resistance and unforgiving terrain it was nearly 20 years before the spaniards won control of the northern end of the peninsula. Of effective indigenous resistance was yucatán inhabited by maya societies. It is located on the north part of the yucatán peninsula.
ɟʝukaˈtan officially the free and sovereign state of yucatán is one of the 32 states which comprise the federal entities of mexico it is divided into 106 municipalities and its capital city is mérida. ˈ t æ n ˌ j uː k ɑː ˈ t ɑː n spanish. ˌ j ʊ k us.
Yucatán ˌ j uː k ə ˈ t ɑː n also uk. Encompassing some 76 300 square miles 197 600 square km it includes the mexican states of campeche quintana roo and yucatán and in the. Yucatán peninsula a northeastern projection of central america lying between the gulf of mexico to the west and north and the caribbean sea to the east.
Yucatán has the highest percentage of indigenous language speakers in the country. The yucatán peninsula is home to north america s largest indigenous population the mayans. Some of the better known are chichen itza coba tulum and.
There are many maya archaeological sites throughout the peninsula. The yucatán peninsula constitutes a significant proportion of the ancient maya lowlands although the maya culture extended south of the yucatán peninsula through present guatemala and into honduras and highland chiapas and was the center of the mayan civilization. Indigenous americas mexico includes the southeastern united states indigenous americas north covers most of the united states and parts of canada indigenous americas yucatan peninsula located in mexico the following regions are indigenous regions but are not referred to as indigenous americas on ancestry.
