Zaculeu was first occupied in the 5th century, and the buildings from this era show the influence of Teotihuacan. The bulk of the site's construction dates from the Post-Classic era, from the 10th century until the early 16th century.
The site contains a number of temple-pyramids and governmental palaces around a series of plaza, and a court for playing the Mesoamerican ballgame. The site was originally fortified with walls.
The city was attacked Conquistador Pedro de Alvarado in 1525, but the well defended city at first threw back the Spanish. Alvarado left his brother Gonzalo de Alvarado in charge of a seige, with 40 horsemen, 80 Spanish footsoldiers, and some 2,000 native allies from central Mexico. The city was defended by Mam king Caibil Balam commanding some 5,000 (the chronicles are not clear if this is the number of soldiers or the total population of Zaculeu).
After a siege of over a month the Mam were reduced to starvation and in October surrendered to the Spanish. After this Zaculeu it was abandoned, and the new city of Huehuetenango established some 5 km away.
In the late 1940s the United Fruit Company sponsored archeological excavations and restorations of the structures. The later included recoating a number of the buildings with white plaster, as it was known that many were originally, but this has seldom been redone in restoring Pre-Columbian buildings.