Captaincy General of Yucatán

The Captaincy General of Yucatán was a first-order administrative division of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, covering the Yucatán Peninsula in what is now eastern Mexico and northern Belize. The peninsula was densely settled by Postclassic Maya states when Spanish expeditions first reached it in 1517–1519; Francisco de Montejo received a charter to conquer it in 1526, and campaigns between 1527 and 1544 subdued most of the region, with Mérida founded in 1542. For most of the sixteenth century Yucatán was governed as a province subordinate to the Audiencia of Mexico. In 1617 the crown raised its governor to captain general, giving the province greater administrative and military autonomy as part of a wider attempt to defend the Caribbean against foreign incursions. The captaincy remained under the viceroy of New Spain, whose orders its governors were bound to obey, while the Audiencia heard appeals. Its territory corresponded roughly to the modern states of Yucatán, Campeche, Quintana Roo and Tabasco, with nominal claims over northern Petén and Belize. The economy rested on agriculture, cattle and the export of dyewoods rather than the gold that early conquerors had hoped for. In 1786 the Bourbon reforms created an intendancy of Yucatán with broad fiscal and economic powers. On 15 September 1821 Mérida declared independence from Spain, and Yucatán was incorporated into the Mexican Empire that November.