The Historical Archive of the Cathedral of San Marcos: Considerations on its content, importance and current value

Abstract

The city of San Marcos, whose origins are found in the first decades of the period of Hispanic domination, has preserved for posterity two great sources of historical information and documentary legacy: the Municipal Historical Archive and the Cathedral. The Historical Archive of the Cathedral of San Marcos constitutes a primary source of information. Its first book dates from 1688 and its first written document from 1677, constituting the oldest historical and documentary record of the history of the municipality and department of San Marcos in terms of the ecclesiastical sphere, as well as the variety of its records, books , information, are of vital importance for the memory and research of History, Anthropology, Sociology, Theology and genealogical studies, it is very possible that San Marcos has the privilege of having one of the few complete and current parish archives throughout and width of the current Republic of Guatemala, since it has been the case that several places have been lost due to deterioration, looting or ignorance that has led their own custodians to destroy them, as well as the case that some parishes have transferred to their old episcopal or archiepiscopal sees their old documents and in other cases, when the parishes have been in charge of religious, they have transferred the old documents and records to their conventual headquarters in Guatemala City, losing their original place the documents.