Francisco de Montejo

Who was Francisco de Montejo?

Francisco de Montejo y Alvarez was a Spanish conquistador in Mexico and Central America.

Francisco de Montejo was born in Salamanca, Spain, in 1479 to Juan de Montejo and Catalina Alvarez de Tejeda. He left Spain in 1514, and arrived in Cuba in time to join Grijalva's expedition along the coast of Yucatán and the Gulf of Mexico. There he had the rank of Captain, and command of 4 ships. On his return to Cuba, he joined with Hernan Cortes and as part of that expedition, helped found the city of La Rica Villa de la Vera Cruz in Mexico. Cortes then sent him as an envoy back to Spain in 1519 to report on the expedition. While in Spain Montejo married Beatriz de Herrera.

In December 1526 the Spanish King, Carlos I, issued a royal decree naming Montejo Adelantado and Capitan General of Yucatán. He returned to Yucatán in 1528, and attempted to conquer it along the east coast but was driven back by the ferocity of the resistance of the Maya living along this coast. In 1530 he decided to try conquering Yucatán from the west, and began by pacifying what is today the modern Mexican state of Tabasco.