262 
GUATEMALA. 
chiquels besieged for fifteen days, and on its fall they put 
to the sword the entire garrison. 
Now the Cakchiquels were by far the most important 
of the ruling tribes of Central America, and it was near 
the close of the fifteenth century. The white men had 
already landed on the coast of America, and the history 
of the tribes was hastening to a close. Insurrections 
here, treasons and plots there, make the substance of 
what there is to tell. The attempt of Cay-Hunahpu to 
incite rebellion shook the kingdom, but failed in the end. 
Revolutions gradually loosed the feudal chains that bound 
the subject tribes, and several of them proclaimed their 
independence. Chief among these were the Sacatepequez, 
who chose a king from their own tribe with the title 
Achi-Calel, and the capital of their kingdom was Yampuk; 
only three kings reigned, until the Conquest. The Po- 
komans from Cuscatlan came to Sacatepequez seeking 
land, and they were well provided with lands and settle¬ 
ments by the Sacatepequez, that they might not ally 
themselves with the hated Cakchiquels. 
In 1510 the king of the Cakchiquels, Oxlahuhtzi, died, 
and the next year his colleague, Cablahu-Tihax, died 
also ; and Hunig and Lahuh Noh succeeded their fathers. 
Their reign was remarkable for an embassy sent by 
Montezuma to the kings of Central America. What the 
object of the Mexicans may have been, the Chronicles do 
not explain. Fuentes supposes that not Montezuma, but 
the eighth Mexican king Ahuitzotl was the one who tried 
to communicate with his southern neighbors. Certainly 
this king carried his arms as far as Nicaragua along the 
shores of the Pacific Ocean; but there is no proof that he 
ever penetrated the interior of Guatemala. Whatever 
