Diego de Landa

After hearing of Roman Catholic Maya who continued to practice idol worship, Landa ordered an Inquisition in Mani, ending with a ceremony called auto de fé. During the ceremony on July 12, 1562, a disputed number of Maya codices (according to Landa, 27 books) and approximately 5000 Maya cult images were burned. Only three pre-Columbian books of Maya hieroglyphics (also known as a codex) and fragments of a fourth[4][5][6] are known to have survived. Collectively, the works are known as the Maya codices.

Landa's Inquisition involved the use of a level of physical abuse on certain indigenous Maya that many viewed as excessive and was, at the very least, unusual. Scores of Maya nobles were jailed pending interrogation, and large numbers of Maya nobles and commoners were subjected to examination under "hoisting."[7] During hoisting, a victim's hands were bound and looped over an extended line that was then raised until the victim's entire body was suspended in the air. Often, stone weights were added to the ankles or lashes applied to the back during interrogation. During his later trial for his actions, Landa vehemently denied that any deaths or injuries directly resulted from these procedures.[8]

Scholars have argued that Mexican inquisitions showed little concern to eradicate magic or convict individuals for heterodox beliefs[9] and that witchcraft was treated more as a religious problem capable of being resolved by confession and absolution. Landa, however, perhaps inspired by intolerant fellow Franciscan Cardenal, Cisneros, from the same Toledo convent, was "monomaniacal in his fervor"[10] against it. Landa believed a huge underground network of apostasies,[11] led by displaced indigenous priests, were jealous of the power the Church enjoyed and sought to reclaim it for themselves. The apostates, Landa surmised, had launched a counteroffensive against the Church, and he believed it was his duty to expose the evil before it could revert the population to their old heathen ways.

Landa claimed that he had discovered evidence of human sacrifice and other idolatrous practices while rooting out native idolatry. Although one of the alleged victims of said sacrifices, Mani Encomendero Dasbatés, was later found to be alive, and Landa's enemies contested his right to run an inquisition,[12] Landa insisted a papal bull, Exponi nobis, justified his actions.[11]

However, Lopez de Cogolludo, Landa's chief Franciscan biographer, wrote of Landa's firsthand experiences with human sacrifices. When Landa first came to the Yucatán, he made it his mission to walk the breadth of the peninsula and preach to the most remote villages.[13] While passing through Cupules, he came upon a group of 300 about to sacrifice a young boy. Enraged, Landa stormed through the crowd, released the boy, smashed the idols and began preaching with such zeal and sincerity that they begged him to remain in the land and teach them more.[14]

Landa was remarkable in that he was willing to go where no others would. He entered lands that had been only recently conquered, where native resentment of Spaniards was still very intense. Armed with nothing but the conviction to learn as much of native culture as he could in order to aid his work,[15] Landa formulated an intimate contact with natives. Natives placed him in such an esteemed position they were willing to show him some of their sacred writings that had been transcribed on deerskin books.[16] To Landa and the other Franciscan friars, the very existence of these Maya codices was proof of diabolical practices. In references to the books, Landa said:

We found a large number of books in these characters and, as they contained nothing in which were not to be seen as superstition and lies of the devil, we burned them all, which they (the Maya) regretted to an amazing degree, and which caused them much affliction.[17]

. The original is in section XLI of Landa, "Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan".

Landa's insistence of widespread cults throughout the Yucatán is backed by ample evidence. Rituals the Spanish conquerors could not understand were labeled as idolatry, superstition, or even devil worship. One such ritual involved clay idols that were used in a combination of Catholicism and indigenous religion.[17] During the ceremonies, individuals would be crucified and then have their hearts removed from their chest and their blood smeared onto the idols. Such ceremonies were practiced throughout the Yucatán up to 45 years after the arrival of the Spaniards.

Landa always believed in his inquisition and was driven to achieve its aims.[18] Landa, like most other Franciscans, subscribed to millenarian ideas,[19] which demanded the mass conversion of as many souls as possible before the turn of the century. Eliminating evil and pagan practices, Landa believed, would usher the Second Coming of Christ much sooner.

Many historians believe there can be little doubt old traditions would continue even during Spanish rule, and because of "the resilience of the old social order, and the determination of its custodians to sustain the old ways, some human killings persisted into the post-conquest period...."[20]

While Landa did coerce confessions his awareness that human sacrifice was occurring around him meant that he was willing to sacrifice a handful of sinners to save the overall community.[2]

Landa's Relación De Las Cosas De Yucatán is about as complete a treatment of Maya religion as is ever likely.[21] While controversy surrounds his use of force in the conversion process, few scholars would debate the general accuracy of his recordings. Allen Wells calls his work an "ethnographic masterpiece,"[22] and William J. Folan, Laraine A. Fletcher and Ellen R. Kintz have written that the account of Maya social organization and towns before conquest is a "gem."[23] The writings are the main contemporary source for Maya history,[21] without which the knowledge of Maya ethnology would be devastatingly small.[24] Much more would now be known about Mayan history and culture if de Landa had not burned anywhere from 27 to what Mayan Historian George Stuart speculates as "hundreds, maybe thousands of [Maya] books. We will never know."[25]