Christopher Columbus travels to the Gulf of…

Christopher Columbus travels to the Gulf of Honduras during his fourth voyage in 1502.

A few years later, two of his navigators, Martín Pinzon and Juan De Solis, sail northward along the coast of Belize to the Yucatan.

Hernan Cortes conquers Mexico in 1519 and Pedro Arias Davila founds Panama City.

Spain soon sends expeditions to Guatemala and Honduras, and the conquest of the Yucatan begins in 1527.

There are settlements of Ch'ol-speaking Manche in the southwestern corner of present-day Belize when Cortes passes through this area in 1525.

The Spanish will forcibly displace these settlements to the Guatemalan highlands when they "pacify" the region in the seventeenth century.

The Spanish launch their main incursions into the area from the Yucatan, however, and encounter stiff resistance from the Mayan provinces of Chetumal and Dzuluinicob.