Salamá was settled as a doctrine by the Order of Preachers in the 1550s, as part of the Tezulutlán Capitulations that friar Bartolomé de las Casas lobbied from the Crown.

[4] After independence in 1821, the Central Ameran liberal criollos tried to remove the Catholic Church from power, along with the Guatemalan aristocrats of the Aycinena family [es].

[5] In Salamá, they had to leave behind their monastery, church and vines, which were confiscated by the Guatemalan State government,[4] but remained abandoned due to the political turmoil of the times.

After this, Morazán began a strong offensive, destroying every single town in his path, stealing the few belongings and forcing Carrera militants to hide in the mountains.

[10] Morazán helped Los Altos and appointed Mariano Rivera Paz, who was close to the Aycinena family; however he did not return to the former aristocrats any of their confiscated possessions.

[14][15] Morazán would come to regret that decision, as Carrera would eventually defeat him in 1840, finishing the Honduran general run as the main political figure of Central America.

Satisfied with the response of Reyna Barrios, Barillas made sure a huge column of Quetzaltenango and Totonicapán Indigenous people came down from the mountains to vote for the general.

The official agents did their job: Reyna was elected president[19] and, so as not to offend the losing candidates, Barillas gave them checks to cover the costs of their presidential campaigns.

In 1905, the family was forced to move to Salamá, where Miguel Ángel Asturias lived on his grandparents' farm and[21] came in contact with Guatemalan natives for the first time.

[25] Confronted with the situation, the opposition had only one clear goal: to defend the privileges that they had enjoyed in Guatemala for generations and so they embraced anticommunism to justify their fight against the government.

[23] This event however began government prosecution of anticommunist elements, which gradually escalated until it became pure repression in May 1954, when CIA Operation PBSuccess and the Carlos Castillo Armas invasion were well in progress and the Arbenz regime was practically doomed.