A Bit of La Mosquitía History

Civilization in La Mosquitía began at least 3,000 years ago with the Cibcha-speaking indigenous tribe from South America. Hundreds of archeological sites and stone ruins here date back from AD 500 to AD 1500, indicating a population boom that coincides with the decline in the Mayan empire to the west. Local indigenous lore hints at the existence of La Ciudad Blanca, or White City, a mysterious lost city whose legend was first recorded by Hernan Cortés in 1526. Although expeditions since then have turned up empty-handed, initiatives headed by the Honduran Institute of Anthropology and History are steadily making new discoveries about the region's ancient past.

Explorer Christopher Columbus preceded Cortés here when he landed on the coast in 1502 and dubbed the region Gracias a Dios, or Thanks to God, following a rough voyage from the island of Guanaja. Spanish missionaries struggled for a century to colonize the coast, and they are thought to have coined the name "Miskito" for the native inhabitants. All the while, French and British privateers found cover in the coast's hidden cays and lagoons. History here is in the place names: heavy artillery once buttressed modern-day Cannon Cay, and Brus Laguna, formerly Brewer's Lagoon, is a tribute to a pirate named "Bloody Brewer" who frequented these parts. In the 17th century, the British expanded their trading presence by building alliances with indigenous leaders, whom the Europeans crowned as royalty in the area they dubbed the Miskito Kingdom. The Spanish ultimately took control of the coast in 1787, although the British continually stepped in to preserve the Miskito's sovereignty.

British presence weakened in 1860 with the U.S.-backed Monroe Doctrine. Nearly 40 years later, after a Spanish resolution to end territorial disputes, Honduras received land north and west of Río Coco, while Nicaragua absorbed the Miskito port town of Bluefields and everything up to today's border between the two countries. But the border remains permeable. In the 1950s, Nicaragua reclaimed ownership of the entire Mosquito Coast, including the newly established Gracias a Dios department in Honduras. The International Court of Justice, however, ruled in 1960 that Nicaragua must respect the boundaries drawn by Spain earlier that century. Two decades later, armed conflicts between Nicaragua's leftist Sandinista government and U.S.-supported contras drove many Miskitos to seek refuge on Honduran soil.Although La Mosquitía remains a legal department of Honduras, the region is largely autonomous and difficult to monitor. Illegal logging and unrestricted crops of African palms are damaging the rain forest, and South American drug runners move illicit goods north via the at-times lawless coast.