The
Spanish conquest of Guatemala was a protracted conflict during the
Spanish colonisation of the Americas, in which Spanish colonisers gradually incorporated the territory that became the modern country of
Guatemala into the colonial Viceroyalty of
New Spain. Before the conquest, this territory contained a number of competing
Mesoamerican kingdoms, the majority of which were
Maya. Many
conquistadors viewed the Maya as "
infidels" who needed to be forcefully converted and pacified, disregarding the achievements of their
civilization. The first contact between the Maya and
European explorers came in the early 16th century when a
Spanish ship sailing from
Panama to
Santo Domingo was wrecked on the east coast of the
Yucatán Peninsula in 1511. Several Spanish expeditions followed in 1517 and 1519, making landfall on various parts of the Yucatán coast. The Spanish conquest of the Maya was a prolonged affair; the Maya kingdoms resisted integration into the
Spanish Empire with such tenacity that their defeat took almost two centuries.