The study of terrestrial mammals in Guatemala dates back to records made by the Mayan civilization. After the peak of this civilization, no further mammal records were produced until the colonial period, when European explorers arrived in the region. Chroniclers from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries mentioned quadrupeds in their accounts. Later, Creole intellectuals in New Spain created natural history collections in Guatemala under orders from the Spanish Crown, but their findings were never published. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Alston’s Mammalia volume from the Biologia Centrali-Americana series (1879–1882) published the first mammal records for the country. However, it was not until the mid-twentieth century that the first Guatemalan researcher, Jorge A. Ibarra, wrote the first book about the country’s mammals. Since the late twentieth century, new records, lists, and species descriptions have emerged. This trend has continued into the twenty-first century, accompanied by efforts to develop conservation strategies led by national professionals.