El Baile de la Conquista: The Tale the Conquered Are Allowed to Tell

This past weekend, Santiago Atitlán held its annual fair to commemorate Saint James (Santiago in Spanish), the community’s patron saint. It was a slightly under-illuminated affair, the pandemic exiling the carnival rides to an empty field well outside the city and cancelling the annual marimba concert altogether. Still, much went on as usual. The image of Saint James traveled the streets atop the shoulders of persevering bearers. The patron’s special brotherhood inaugurated his feast day with several rounds of sleep-depriving 4 AM rocket blasts. Feathered and masked young men danced for hours in a historical reenactment called “el Baile de la Conquista.” 

It was this last event that most captured my attention

The dance itself is less a simple set of movements than a full-scale theatrical production. The plot concerns the original Spanish conquest of the Mayan population. In the dance’s penultimate scene, the Spanish commander defeats the heroic Tecún Umán (a figure whose historical existence is dubious, but whose role as a mythological focal point is undeniable). The defeated Mayans, watching their leader’s downfall from the shadows, are left to bend the knee and take on the religion of their conquerors: Catholicism.

The dance is no modern invention. Combining age-old Mayan movements with Spanish narrative tropes (most notably those of el Baile de los Moros), el Baile de la Conquista originated in the conquered indigenous communities of colonial Guatemala. The Spanish friars encouraged its proliferation, confident its pro-Catholic conclusion could only benefit their cause. They had no reason to disapprove of a story glorifying their own triumph. 

When it comes to historical narratives, we’re used to hearing that the winners always get to tell the story. Here, however, we see something a bit more complex: the winners letting the losers tell the story, but in a way that the winners find satisfactory. Perhaps in the years after the conquest some Mayan dances told a different tale, one depicting the true price of Spanish brutality and the spiritual pain of forced conversion. If those dances did exist, they weren’t allowed to survive. It’s little wonder why.