For the Spanish to maintain their control over the indigenous people of Yucatan, they had to devise ways to split the Mayan population and prevent them from uniting with each other. This painting by Marcelo Jimenez depicts a member of the Mayan hidalgo (nobility) presenting his captured brother before the Spanish landowner to be punished for trying to escape. The Spanish favored the Mayan hidalgos through granting them extra rights and privileges, and therefore won over an influential section of Mayan society. The hidalgos could then be used to control the other Maya who, through birthright, were lower down the Maya heirachy and therefore respectful to the hidalgos (indirectly the Spanish!).
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