The Maya city of Copán
is a beautiful city that rose and declined seven centuries before
Columbus set foot on Honduras.
Copán was considered to be one of the greatest
ceremonial center or temple cities of the Maya empire.
The Mayans have been called the "Greeks
of the New World" because of their fantastic achievements in
architecture, stone construction, painting, sculpture, astronomy
and other artistic and scientific developments.
The Ruins of
Copán represent the highest artistic and cultural
achievement of the ancient Maya Civilization. The extensive grounds
of the Archaeological park embrace the remains of many majestic
temples and pyramids decorated with thousands of fragments of architectural
sculpture. Copán was restored in 1839 after
its discovery in a thick jungle
UNESCO proclaimed Copán a World Heritage
Site in 1980. Today, it's rich stone sculptures and intricate hieroglyphs
make Copán a must-see place for travelers .
Between 16th and 19th centuries, the Spaniards more
or less controlled the government of Honduras. The only Indians
of Honduras which today still maintain something of a culture and
a language of their own are the "Zambo"
or the "Mosquitos" Indians
of the mosquitia coasts. The mosquitos who played various parts
in the wars between the English and the Spanish and internal civil
wars of the country have survived to the present era and have much
the same culture and practices as were first recorded centuries
People -- There are almost 2,000,000
people in Honduras living mostly in rural regions. Social classes
are complicated and often are determined by family genealogy, wealth,
occupation, education, place of birth and skin color.
Mestizo, the name given to people of Spanish and Indian
ancestry, represent about 91% of the total population
|Spanish is the principal language and is spoken throughout the
country, although English (spoken with a broad Caribbean accent)
is the language of choice in the Bay Islands.
The remaining Indian tribes have their own distinct
Honduran crafts include woodcarving (notably wooden instruments), basketry, embroidery
and textile arts, leather craft and ceramics. The country's food is based
around beans, rice, tortillas, fried bananas, meat, potatoes, cream and cheese.
The coming of Europeans resulted in the downfall
of most of the cultures of the Central American and Northern Andean
region. Few of the chiefdoms survived beyond the 17th century,
and none exists in similar form today.
The Garifuna (pronounced Ga-RIF-una), or Black Caribs, are a unique
cultural and ethnic group. They first appeared in this area over
300 years ago, when escaped and shipwrecked slaves mixed with the
native Caribs who had given them a place to stay on Saint Vincent
Island. The Garifuna adopted the Carib language but kept their African
musical and religious traditions, against the demands of the island's
Jicaque Indians of the northwest coast of Honduras. Their
culture is similar to that of the Sumo and Miskito of northeastern
Nicaragua. The Jicaque are an agricultural people, growing sweet
manioc (yucca), bitter manioc, beans, and corn (maize) . Fishing
and hunting provide other food. Domesticated animals are now common.