Q'eqchi' people

Infobox Ethnic group
group = Q´eqchi´
population = 852,012 [cite web |url=http://www.ine.gob.gt/Nesstar/Censo2002/survey0/dataSet/dataFiles/dataFile1/var26.html |title= XI Censo Nacional de Población y VI de Habitación (Censo 2002) - Pertenencia de grupo étnico |accessdate=2008-05-27 |publisher=Instituto Nacional de Estadística |date=2002 ]
region1 = flag|Guatemala
pop1 =
ref1 =
region2 = Alta Verapaz
pop2 =
ref2 =
region3 = El Petén
pop3 =
ref3 =
region4 =
pop4 =
ref4 =
region5 =
pop5 =
ref5 =
region6 =
pop6 =
ref6 =
region7 =
pop7 =
ref7 =
region8 =
pop8 =
ref8 =
region9 =
pop9 =
ref9 =
region10 =
pop10 =
ref10 =
languages = Q'eqchi', Spanish
religions = Catholic, Evangelicalist, Maya religion
related =
footnotes =

Q'eqchi' ( or Kekchi in an older orthography) are one of the Maya peoples in Guatemala and Belize, whose indigenous language is also called Q'eqchi'.

Before the beginning in the 1520s of the Spanish conquest of Guatemala, Q'eqchi' settlements were concentrated in what are now the departments of Alta Verapaz and Baja Verapaz. Over the course of the succeeding centuries a series of land displacements, resettlements, persecutions and migrations resulted in a wider dispersal of Q'eqchi' communities, into other regions of Guatemala (Izabal, Petén, El Quiché), southern Belize (Toledo District), and smaller numbers in El Salvador, Honduras and southern Mexico. [See Kahn (2006, pp.34–49) for an account of Q'eqchi' migrational history and the impetus behind these movements, and in particular pp.41–42.] While most notably present in northern Alta Verapaz and southern Petén, [cite web |author=Gordon, Raymond G., Jr. (ed.) |year=2005 |title=Q'eqchi': a language of Guatemala |url=http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=kek |work=Ethnologue |publisher=SIL International |accessdate=2008-05-30; as indicated by 1998 SIL data.] contemporary Q'eqchi' language-speakers are the most widely spread geographically of all Guatemalan Mayan groups. [Kahn (2006, p.34)]

Notes

References

: cite book |author=aut|Gordon, Raymond G., Jr. (ed.) |year=2005 |title=Ethnologue: Languages of the World |edition=Fifteenth edition |format=online version |url=http://www.ethnologue.com |publisher=SIL International |location=Dallas, TX |isbn=1-55671-159-X |oclc=60338097|accessdate=2008-05-30 : cite book |author=aut|Kahn, Hilary E. |year=2006 |title=Seeing and Being Seen: The Q’eqchi’ Maya of Livingston, Guatemala, and Beyond |location=Austin |publisher=University of Texas Press |isbn=978-0-292-71348-2 |oclc=68965681: cite book |author=aut|Wilk, Richard |year=1997 |title=Household Ecology: Economic change and domestic life among the Kekchi Maya in Belize |location=DeKalb, IL |publisher=Northern Ilinois University Press |isbn=978-0875805757 |oclc=97031713: cite book |author=aut|Wilson, Richard |year=1995 |title=Maya Resurgence in Guatemala: Q’eqchi’ Experiences |location=Norman |publisher=University of Oklahoma Press |isbn=0-8061-2690-6 |oclc=31172908