14 INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY—PUBLICATION NO. 4 
Negroes here, for they are rarely seen in Southwest 
Guatemala today; mulattoes along the’ littoral and 
elsewhere in the Lowlands represent perhaps the 
modern vestiges of this miscegenation. Most of 
Guatemala’s small Negro population live in the east- 
ern Lowlands, in Livingston and Puerto Barrios, 
where they are employed as stevedores. 
Pineda, later in the 16th century, tells of certain 
Indians in Soconusco who had “male and female 
negroes as servants” (Pineda, 1908, p. 442). Alonso 
Ponce in 1586, when near Grionda, a place at the 
fork of the Camino Real where it branched to Chiapas 
and to Soconusco, passed ‘‘some negro women and 
others” (Ponce, 1873, vol. 1, p. 291). Later, at 
Quetzalapa, near Tonala, in Soconusco, his party was 
given a calf and some salt, to make jerked beef, for 
“that uninhabited road which had to be traversed, by 
a negro estanciero”’ (ibid., p. 298). 
Ponce also mentions (1873, vol. 1, p. 403) the 
appearance of “many Negroes” near Sonsonate (in 
modern El Salvador), a few near Los Esclavos, in 
eastern Guatemala (ibid., vol. 1, p. 406), and Negro 
laborers in Chiapas, (ibid., vol. 1, p. 437). From this 
widespread distribution before the end of the 16th 
century, mentioned quite casually, we see that Ne- 
groes were fairly numerous, and that their principal 
concentration was apparently in the Pacific area of 
Guatemala. 
There may be some implication of Indian-Negro 
cross (zambo) in the same Santiago Zambo, the 
early village of the piedmont which today is Finca 
Zambo, in Suchitepequez. It is not far from the 
coastal lands of the Xankatales (Highland Nahuala- 
Santa Catarina Ixtahuacan Indians), who are among 
the darkest-skinned of the Guatemala Indians, possi- 
bly because they may have absorbed some of the early 
Negro blood. Although Negroes as such apparently 
fade from history after the 17th century, it may be 
noted that even today, in various parts of the Low- 
lands, particularly in the shore towns, mulattoes and 
zambos can be recognized. I saw them in Tahuesco, 
and had reports of them also in other littoral centers. 
In the story of Los Esclavos as told by Dollfus and 
Mont-Serrat (1868, p. 33) it is stated that “almost 
all of the inhabitants are zambos. .” The ac- 
count of Negro slaves does not agree with that of 
Ponce’s companion, who said that a former president 
had released 10,000 Mexican Indian slaves, and even 
in 1586 the place was called Los Esclavos (Ponce, 
1873, vol. 1, p. 318). 
POPULATION DENSITIES AND CENTERS 
The great, forested plain of Guatemala’s largest de- 
partment, El Petén, comprising over one-third of the 
Nation’s land area, is in large part almost uninhabited, 
having an average density of about one-half per sq. 
km. (1% per sq. mile) if we exclude Flores, a town of 
1,500, wherein a fifth of the district’s people reside. 
Three-fourths of the total are clustered in miserable 
little villages and chicle camps, scattered over this 
low, fever-ridden region. By contrast, the High- 
lands farther south present the other extreme, with 
thickly settled agricultural communities occupying the 
more favorable valleys and basins. 
Exclusive of El Petén, the Guatemala density of 
population is about 35 per sq. km. (87.5 per sq. mile). 
PHYSICAL FACTORS AFFECTING POPULATION 
DENSITY 
Distribution of population is extremely spotty, with 
limited favorable areas having densities well over 100 
per sq. km. (250 per sq. mile), adjacent to unpeopled 
volcanic slopes or deep barrancas (map 8). The line 
of demarcation is often sharp in the Valley of Quezal- 
tenango, where the municipio of that name has a rural 
density of 127 per sq. km. (317.5 per sq. mile), while 
the adjacent volcanic mountains of El Baul, Cerro 
Quemado, and Santa Maria are virtually uninhabited 
above about 2,700 m. (8,858 ft.). Water supply is 
a determining factor of the first magnitude here; dur- 
ing the half-year dry season, springs cease to flow on 
the higher volcanic slopes. The steepness here is, 
furthermore, unsuited to house construction. Along 
the precipitous shores of Lake Atitlan (pls. 45 and 
46), villages are crowded upon low ridges and ter- 
races above high-water lines of both lake and streams 
(map 20). Only in the piedmont are terrain and 
water supply alike usually favorable, except on the 
sides of small ravines and secondary volcanic cones. 
Climatic advantages favor the Highlands, and often 
outweigh such detrimental factors as rugged terrain, 
remote water supply, and isolation. 
It is in the Highlands, then, that population is 
primarily concentrated (map 8). Most Indian 
villages are between elevations of 1,500 m. (4,921 ft.) 
and 2,800 m. (9,186 ft.) ; plantation settlements be- 
tween 350 m. (1,148 ft.) and 1,500 m. There is a 
distinct alinement of villages and towns, chiefly finca 
markets, along the lower isohyps (350 m.), with 14 
major ones (over 1,000 population) and 11 minor 
ones, between about 250 m. (820 ft.) and 400 m. 
