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The small Guatemalan territory, with its 108 thousand square kilometers, surrounds several cultural treasures inherited from a past fill with incidents and changes. One of the most attracting for travelers is the artistic legacy left from the Hispanic period, best known as colonial.

The Central American isthmus was denominated by the Spaniards as the Kingdom of Guatemala, locating its capital city in Santiago de Guatemala. Along the whole region, the authorities constructed entire cities, with buildings that with many troubles managed to stay up to our days. Part of its main attraction is the fact that after centuries of use, earthquakes and human attacks, they have overcome the difficulties and still stand, specially due to the genius builders.

Every village was relocated by the Hispanic authorities. The ancient Mayan capitals were reorganized in nearby places, with a trace that could remind them of the Hispanic cities. Though they were built by indigenous, some of the uses of each region were included. So, the k’iche’ capital, Gumarcaaj, was built closely and called Santa Cruz del Quiché; Iximché, was established as Tecpán, and Zaculeu gave birth to Huehuetenango, just to give some examples.

Each of these villages acquired its own characteristics, product of the cultural cross-breed between indigenous and Spanish, a blend that merge little by little.

Any Guatemalan site has evidence of this merging, that occurred slowly during the XVI, XVII and XVIII centuries. Of all these, the most known is Santiago de Guatemala, now called La Antigua Guatemala, whose nickname is Colonial City; in this small territory beautiful masterpieces were built.

Salcajá, Quetzaltenango has the first church erected in the region, whose walls go way back to the XVI century, but with modifications of the XVIII century. San Andrés Xecul, Totonicapán has the best expression of popular baroque. On the other side of the country, in Esquipulas, the architect Felipe de Porres built a basilica; Quezaltepeque has a temple with beautiful arches with mixed lines; in San Cristobal Acasaguastlán the sun shines on the temple in a baroque work of this heavenly body, these are all temples built on the XVIII century.

Beautiful altar-pieces of different times are kept in San Agustín Acasaguastlán, as well as in Tecpán, San Jerónimo Verapaz and Salamá.

Besides, there are buildings left in Antigua, each one with a history so relevant that reveals so many secrets as the ones it hides; and the masterpieces that were transferred to the capital city of Guatemala, were neoclassical temples include treasures from previous centuries, built in the Renaissance, Mannerism, Baroque, and Ultra baroque.

Well now, in any corner of this country you will have a peek of its cultural legacy, which has been preserved in spite of the weather misfortunes and natural adversities, hoping to tell the facts that it has witnessed.