49 Fun Facts About Central America

How many countries is Central America usually said to contain?

Seven: Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama; Mexico is added only in specialised contexts.

Belize is the only Central American country with which official language?

English: Belize was a British colony until independence and kept English as its sole official language; Belizean Creole, Spanish and Mayan languages are also widely spoken.

Which Guatemalan volcano's 1902 eruption was among the largest of the twentieth century?

Santa María's October 1902 eruption (VEI 6) blasted a new crater from its flank, killed thousands, and later spawned the Santiaguito lava-dome complex that began growing in 1922.

Most of Central America declared independence from Spain in which year?

1821: the Act of Independence of Central America was signed in Guatemala City on 15 September 1821; the region was briefly annexed by Mexico before forming its own federation in 1823.

Which colonial unit governed most of Central America for two centuries before independence?

The Captaincy General of Guatemala, seated in Santiago de los Caballeros and later Nueva Guatemala, answered to the viceroy in Mexico City and included the modern Mexican state of Chiapas.

Where does Guatemala rank by population among Central American countries?

About 17.6 million people live there, making it the fourth most populous nation in all of North America.

The name Guatemala comes from a Nahuatl word meaning what?

Place of many trees: Nahuatl Cuauhtēmallān combines cuahuitl (tree) with a suffix of abundance, a calque of the K'iche' name meaning 'many trees'.

Which peak is the highest point in Central America?

Tajumulco: the Guatemalan volcano in San Marcos department rises to 4,220 metres, the highest point in Central America, near the border with Mexico's Chiapas.

Which lake is the deepest in Central America?

Atitlán: the Guatemalan caldera lake reaches about 340 metres deep, far beyond Lake Nicaragua's roughly 26 metres; its name means 'between the waters'.

Which Guatemalan Maya city was the first mixed UNESCO World Heritage Site?

Tikal: listed in 1979 for both culture and nature, its temples sit inside a Petén rainforest national park.

Which bird is Guatemala's national animal and the name of its currency?

Quetzal: the resplendent quetzal appears on Guatemala's flag and coat of arms and is the largest member of the trogon family.

Antigua Guatemala remained the colonial capital until which year?

1773: the Santa Marta earthquakes of that year wrecked the city and the crown ordered the capital moved to today's Guatemala City; the Baroque ruins earned UNESCO status in 1979.

Belize gained independence from the United Kingdom in which year?

1981: Belize became independent on 21 September 1981; progress was slowed for years by Guatemala's claim to sovereignty over Belizean territory.

What is the capital of Belize?

Belmopan: the planned inland capital was built after a 1961 hurricane devastated coastal Belize City, and government moved there in 1970.

What was Belize called under UK colonial rule?

British Honduras: the settlement was formally declared a colony under that name in 1862, administered from Jamaica until 1884.

Which 1961 storm prompted Belize to move its capital inland?

Hurricane Hattie: the Category 5 storm struck on 31 October 1961, the second devastation of Belize City in thirty years after the 1931 hurricane.

Belize's coral system is the world's second largest after which?

Great Barrier Reef: Australia's reef stretches some 2,300 km, far longer than the roughly 1,000-km Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System that runs from Cancún down to Honduras.

Which diver made Belize's Great Blue Hole famous as a top-five dive site?

Jacques Cousteau: his 1971 Calypso expedition charted the sinkhole, about 318 metres across and 124 metres deep in Lighthouse Reef, and he ranked it among the world's top dive sites.

Belize banned which fishing method throughout its waters in 2010?

Bottom trawling: Belize outlawed the seabed-dragging method nationwide in December 2010, and in 2015 banned offshore oil exploration within a kilometre of its barrier reef.

What is the capital of Honduras?

Tegucigalpa: Comayagua held the title until 1880, when President Marco Aurelio Soto moved the government to the silver-mining town in the central highlands.

"Banana republic" was coined for a Honduran democracy dominated by what?

Corporations: O. Henry coined the term in Cabbages and Kings (1904) for a fictional country modelled on Honduras, where American fruit companies such as United Fruit dominated politics.

The Honduran currency is named after which figure?

An indigenous leader: Lempira, a Lenca chieftain, led resistance to the Spanish conquest in the 1530s; the currency bearing his name replaced the peso in 1931.

Which Maya city in Honduras became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980?

Copán: the Honduran site was the capital of a Classic-period kingdom refounded in AD 426 by K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', and is famed for its Hieroglyphic Stairway.

Which explorer became the first European to visit Honduras's Bay Islands, in 1502?

Christopher Columbus: on his fourth and final voyage in 1502 he reached Guanaja in the Bay Islands before landing on the mainland near modern Trujillo.

The 1969 Football War between El Salvador and Honduras is also known by what name?

Also called the 100 Hour War, it flared over migration tensions around a World Cup qualifier.

El Salvador's nickname Pulgarcito de America translates as what?

Tom Thumb of the Americas: pulgarcito is Spanish for 'little thumb', the fairy-tale Tom Thumb, a nod to El Salvador being the smallest country on the American mainland.

In 2001, El Salvador replaced its colón with which currency?

The US dollar: the Monetary Integration Law of 2001 made the dollar legal tender alongside the colón, which had circulated since 1892 and was soon withdrawn.

In 2021, El Salvador made which asset legal tender?

Bitcoin: the Bitcoin Law took effect on 7 September 2021, making El Salvador the first country to adopt it as legal tender; a January 2025 amendment made acceptance voluntary.

Spanish authorities in El Salvador commercialised which indigenous crop around Izalco?

Cacao: the Pipil around Izalco grew cacao long before the conquest and Spanish settlers made it the province's first export; indigo later dominated, and coffee took over only in the nineteenth century.

Which Central American country is the largest by area?

Nicaragua: at roughly 130,000 km² it edges out Honduras (about 112,000 km²) and Guatemala (about 109,000 km²) as the largest country in Central America.

What is the capital of Nicaragua?

Managua: founded in 1819, it became the capital in 1852 as a compromise between the rival cities León and Granada.

Nicaragua's capital was badly damaged by earthquakes in 1931 and which later year?

The 1972 quake destroyed the city centre, which was never fully rebuilt in the same place.

Nicaraguans call their biggest lake Mar Dulce, meaning what?

Locals call it Cocibolca or Mar Dulce, the "Sweet Sea"; it is slightly smaller than Lake Titicaca.

Which unusual animal lives in freshwater Lake Nicaragua?

Scientists once thought they were an endemic species, but they are bull sharks that swim up the San Juan River.

What is the largest island in Lake Nicaragua?

Ometepe: formed by the twin volcanoes Concepción and Maderas, the 276-km² island is by far the largest in Lake Nicaragua; Zapatera is a distant second.

Which conquistador founded Granada and León in Nicaragua?

Francisco Hernández de Córdoba: he founded both cities in 1524 and the córdoba currency carries his name; he was beheaded in 1526 for defying his superior Pedrarias Dávila.

Costa Rica permanently abolished its army under a constitution adopted in which year?

1949: the constitution of 7 November 1949 enshrined the abolition that José Figueres Ferrer had proclaimed on 1 December 1948, after winning that year's brief civil war.

Which two countries share land borders with Costa Rica?

Nicaragua and Panama: Costa Rica's northern border with Nicaragua runs roughly 300 km and its southern border with Panama roughly 330 km, each stretching from the Pacific to the Caribbean.

What is the capital of Costa Rica?

San José: it replaced Cartago as capital in 1823; around 350,000 people live in the city proper and some two million in the surrounding metro area.

Which is Costa Rica's highest volcano?

Irazú: the volcano near Cartago rises to about 3,432 metres; on a clear day both the Pacific and the Caribbean can be seen from the summit.

Which religious group founded the settlement that became Monteverde, Costa Rica?

Several dozen arrived in 1951, partly to avoid the Korean War draft, and named the place "Green Mountain".

Costa Rica's Cocos Island is famed among divers for schools of which animal?

Hammerhead sharks: huge schools of scalloped hammerheads gather off the uninhabited island, reachable only by a 36-hour boat trip, which became a World Heritage Site in 1997.

Panama seceded from which country in 1903?

Colombia: after the Colombian senate rejected the canal treaty, the United States backed Panama's secession on 3 November 1903 and took over the canal project the following year.

Who crossed the isthmus from the Atlantic to the Pacific in 1513?

Vasco Núñez de Balboa: on 25 September 1513 he sighted the Pacific, naming it the South Sea; Panama's currency, the balboa, introduced in 1904 at par with the US dollar, honours him.

The Panama Canal officially opened in which year?

1914: the canal officially opened on 15 August 1914 with the transit of the SS Ancón, a decade after the United States took over the stalled French project.

Which treaties set the handover of the Panama Canal to Panama on 31 December 1999?

Torrijos–Carter: signed on 7 September 1977 by General Omar Torrijos and President Jimmy Carter, the two treaties ended nearly a century of US control of the Canal Zone.

Which artificial lake forms the main stretch of the Panama Canal's route?

Gatun: damming the Chagres River created the lake 26 metres above sea level, and ships cross about 33 km of it, saving enormous excavation work.

The Pan-American Highway is interrupted by which roadless stretch?

Darién Gap: the break runs roughly 106 km between Yaviza in Panama and Turbo in Colombia, through swamp and rainforest with no road.

Who was elected the first president of the Federal Republic of Central America in 1825?

Manuel José Arce: the Salvadoran liberal took office in April 1825; the federation, with its capital in Guatemala City and from 1834 San Salvador, dissolved around 1840.