page_title: Cuilapan de Guerrero
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Cuilapan de Guerrero / History
caption_attribution_description: Vicente Guerrero monument in the yard of the Santiago Apostol Convent. It is located in Cuilapam de Guerrero.Town, Oaxaca, México. From image Convento_Santiago_Apóstol_letreroDañado-Cuilapam_de_Guerrero_Oaxaca_Mexico.jpg we can get more information about Culiapam de Guerrero.
context_page_description: Cuilapan de Guerrero is a town and municipality located in the central valley region of Oaxaca in southern Mexico. It is 10 kilometres to the south of the capital city of Oaxaca on the road leading to Villa de Zaachila, and is in the Centro District in the Valles Centrales region.
  Cuilapan, originally called Sahayuca, has been a permanent settlement since at least 500 BCE. It developed into a city state but was absorbed by Monte Alban until between 600 and 900 CE. After this, Cuilapan returned to being an independent city-state, equal to a number of other important city states in the area. After the Spanish conquest, Cuilapan had a population of over 40,000 people with formidable social, economic and cultural institutions. For this reason, a major monastery dedicated to James the apostle was established there in the 1550s in order to evangelize the Mixtec and Zapotec populations. However, the area underwent decline of its native population in the 16th and early 17th century and the extravagant monastery complex would later deteriorate in the 19th century. Today, the town is a quiet place with a fraction of its former population and prestige.
context_section_description: The Cuilapan area has been settled by humans since 1500 BCE with a sedentary village established by 500 BCE. These sedentary peoples developed activities such as weaving, pottery and stonemasonry, with permanent houses, ceremonial structures and tombs. The society here grew and stratified over time and eventually a simple writing system came into existence. Cuilapan developed as an independent city state until the rise of Monte Alban, which came into dominance because it provided a refuge in a defensible location. During this time, Cuilapan was one of the satellite cities of the dominion. Between 600 and 900 CE, Monte Alban declined and collapsed, allowing Cuilapan and others to become independent again. Excavations from this period show that Cuilapan gained prominence in the post Monte Alban period, but was not dominant over its neighbors and never reached the heights of the former dominion. At that time, Cuilapan was identifiable as a Zapotec city state. Later, in the post-classic period, this and other Zapotec cities would be overrun by the Mixtecs. 
  At the time of the Spanish conquest, Cuilapan was a large multi-ethnic population center of 43,000 people and one of the centers of the political, economic and cultural life of the central valleys of Oaxaca. The area was still the center of an ongoing struggle for dominance between the Mixtecs and the Zapotecs. To complicate things further, the Aztecs also had a presence in the central valleys region, and exacted tribute from Cuilapan through their military garrison in Huaxyácac (today the city of Oaxaca). This tribute included products such as corn, beans, clothing, gold and cochineal. Cuilapan had a number of its own subject settlements which included Camotlán, Etla, Quauxilotitlan [Huitzo], Guaxaca, Macuilcóchitl, Tlacochahuaya, [San Sebastian] Teítipac and Ocotlán. However, the Aztecs sought only tribute and left Mixtec cultural and political traditions here mostly intact.
  The Spanish found a thriving community with formidable political, economic and social organizations. The Mixtecs dominated and society was divided into a ruling class called caciques and commoners called macehuales. This heterogeneous system would mostly stay after the Spanish conquest, with the ruling class keeping many of its privileges with the conditions of conversion to Christianity and fealty to the Spanish crown. The original Mixtec settlement was at the foot of a hill in this area, but the modern town was established by Fray Domingo de Oguinaga and Zapotecs in 1551, with the founding of the monastery of Saint James.
  This monastery was a major center of evangelization efforts in the early colonial period in the central valleys region of Oaxaca, although it was never finished. The Dominicans were in charge of evangelization and in a few years had managed to baptize nearly all the inhabitants. However, this was not enough to ensure acceptance of the new faith, so the monastery with its large open chapel and elaborate murals was begun in the 1550s to reinforce Christian ideas, modified to relate to traditional Mixtec and Zapotec beliefs. However, one major effect the monastery had was to move the population center from the original Mixtec settlement to one surrounding the monastery. 
  Culiapan was caught up in a sovereignty dispute between Hernán Cortés, the Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca, and the city of Antequera (which would become the city of Oaxaca). As the Marquis, Cortés had absolute control over Cuiliapan and sixteen other towns in the valley as well as all of these towns’ subject villages. Residents of the city of Antequera were fearful of Cortés's unchecked political authority in the region in spite of their city charter granting them autonomy. The struggle lasted from the 1520s to the 1530s with each claiming land from the other. Eventually, the authority of the Marquis was limited to four towns known as the Cuatro Villas in 1533, with Culiapan being one of them. With this arrangement, Culiapan became a Spanish “cabecera” (seat) for a number of other, smaller settlements. 
  The decline
caption: Monument where Vicente Guerrero was executed
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