The discovery of the Mayan civilization

The discovery of the Mayan civilization went through several periods:

In 1502, the last voyage of Columbus to the Americas, in a market of the Gulf, Honduras region, he saw a production of fine ceramic basin. According to local businessman said that the pottery from a basin called the "Maya" are shipped. This is the first Europeans heard the words "Maya," the name, and was apparently in no particular attention.

In 1511, and a Spanish ship from Panama sail to Santo Domingo, in the event of disaster the way the sinking, 12 survivors landed on the Yucatan peninsula. After two weeks, these people met Maya, there are five crew members has become sacrificers on the altar. The survivors managed to escape back to the occupied territories of Spain, their experience of the Europeans for the first time in the Mayan heartland.

In 1519, the Spanish explorer Cortez in the conquest of the Aztec Empire of Mexico after advancing to the north and west, in the Yucatan in 1542 established the first colony, after the gradual deepening of the Mayan region.