Diego de Landa

Diego de Landa is perhaps one of the characters most hated of mayan history.
It was a Spanish missionary of the Franciscan Order in the province of Yucatan and the second bishop of the Archdiocese of Yucatán between 1572 and 1579. Is infamemente recognized for being responsible of an inquisitorial trial without prececedentes in America, with a preponderance of torture to extract confessions of paganism and heresy.

In 1562, Landa, established a tribunal of the Holy Inquisition in the village mayan Peanut, with the aim of putting an end to the religious practices of the maya. Landa, like most spaniards, he knew that christianity was not well accepted by the maya peoples, and that in the best of cases, it was accepted so fictitious. The maya continued to maintain their religion and their customs in a clandestine manner. To establish the court in Peanut, Landa began questioning under torture in public to the natives, and to seize their religious artefacts, which included not only images but the codices.

According to reports by the same Landa, during this court were hanged and tortured more than one thousand people, more than a hundred people were burned, destroyed 5000 idols, 13 altars, 197 vessels and 27 codices.
Landa wrote the book, ‘Relation of the things of Yucatán’ in which the priest sought to describe the life of the maya, despite having worked all his life for disappearance of the mayan culture, their writings ended up being a very important source of history.
In the image, murals of Francisco Castro Pacheco and Diego Rivera recreating act of faith Peanut