History of Central America: a timeline

11 moments in the history of Central America, in order, each with what happened and why it matters.

Eras

  1. Before 1492 (15000 BC–1492)
  2. Empire and the colonial Americas (1492–1808)
  3. Revolutions and new nations (1808–1898)
  4. Revolution, war and dictatorship (1898–1975)

Before 1492 (15000 BC–1492)

  1. c. 250–900: The Classic Maya: Tikal, Palenque and the collapse — From about AD 250 to 900 dozens of Maya kingdoms flourished in the lowlands of Guatemala, Belize, Chiapas and Yucatán.

Empire and the colonial Americas (1492–1808)

  1. 29 September 1513: Balboa reaches the Pacific — Vasco Núñez de Balboa, leader of the settlement of Santa María la Antigua del Darién, set out on 1 September 1513 with Spaniards and Indigenous guides to cross…
  2. 1535: The Viceroyalty of New Spain is created — Fourteen years after the fall of Tenochtitlan, Charles V replaced the quarrelling conquerors and the first Audiencia with a viceroy, a 'vice-king' who…
  3. c. 1568: Bernal Díaz writes his True History — Bernal Díaz del Castillo, born in Medina del Campo in the 1490s, sailed with Cortés in 1519 and fought through the conquest of Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras.
  4. 1585–28 January 1596: Drake raids the Spanish Caribbean — Francis Drake, 'El Draque' to the Spaniards, had robbed the mule trains at Nombre de Dios in 1572 and the silver ship Cacafuego off Peru in 1579.
  5. 26 March 1713–1750: The slave asiento goes to Britain — From the sixteenth century the Crown sold the asiento, a monopoly contract to supply enslaved Africans to its American colonies, to Portuguese, Genoese, Dutch…

Revolutions and new nations (1808–1898)

  1. 17 December 1819–17 November 1831: Gran Colombia, Bolívar's republic — On 17 December 1819 the Congress of Angostura passed the Fundamental Law that united Venezuela and New Granada in a single Republic of Colombia; the province…
  2. 15 September 1821: Central America declares independence — Central America won independence without a war.

Revolution, war and dictatorship (1898–1975)

  1. October 1899–3 November 1903: The Thousand Days' War and the loss of Panama — Colombia's last and bloodiest civil war of the nineteenth century began in October 1899, when Liberals rose against the Conservative government.
  2. 15 August 1914: The Panama Canal opens — The United States, having backed Panama's separation from Colombia in November 1903, signed the Hay–Bunau-Varilla treaty with the new republic's French envoy:…
  3. 7 August 1987: Esquipulas II: peace for Central America — By the mid-1980s Central America was at war with itself: the Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua fought US-backed contras, guerrillas fought the army in El…

Changes over time