Quintana Roo signed a treaty with the local government, which Santa Anna ignored. Hoping to settle the differences, Mexico’s President Antonio López de Santa Anna sent Andrés Quintana Roo to Mérida in 1841. An insurrection advocating Yucatecan independence erupted in Tizimín in May 1838 in 1840, the local Congress approved Yucatán’s declaration of independence. In 1835, a conservative unitary system of government was instituted in Mexico and given authority over Yucatán.

When Mexico gained its independence from Spain in February 1821, Yucatán became part of the Independent Mexican Empire but remained a remote province until 1824 when it was divided into three states: Campeche, Quintana Roo and Yucatán. Other indigenous revolts during the colonial period gave Yucatán’s natives the reputation of being fierce and difficult-to-conquer warriors. The fighting resulted in the deaths of thousands of natives and the execution of Canek in the city of Mérida. Jacinto Canek, a convent-educated Mayan, led an indigenous rebellion against the government in 1761. Between 300 and 900, the Mayans built several cities in the Yucatán region, two of the most spectacular being Chichén Itzá and Uxmal. Quintana Roo was considered to be the gateway to the Mayan world. During the pre-classic period (500 B.C.-250 A.D.) they appeared in Quintana Roo, where they established ceremonial centers at Coba, Dzibanche and Kohunlich. One of the most advanced indigenous cultures of the ancient Americas, the Mayans began as hunter gatherers and migrated into the Yucatán around 2500 B.C. Trade activities (agribusiness, textile and apparel production, furniture manufacturing, etc.) represent about 21 percent of the economy, followed by finance and insurance at 19 percent, manufacturing at 13 percent, transportation and communications at 10 percent, agriculture and livestock at 7 percent, construction at 6 percent and mining at 1 percent. Today, service-based companies account for about 23 percent of the state’s economy. Because it was relatively isolated from the rest of Mexico until recently, the state developed its own unique culture.

Mayans flourished and established one of their greatest cities, Chichén Itzá, in what is now Yucatán.

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