Nicoya Culture
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Nicoya Culture
The Kingdom of Nicoya, also called Cacicazgo or Lordship of Nicoya, was an indigenous nation that comprised much of the territory of the current Guanacaste Province, in the North Pacific of Costa Rica. Its political, economic and religious center was the city of Nicoya, located on the peninsula of the same name, which depends on several provinces located on both banks of the Gulf of Nicoya, as well as numerous tributary villages. In the 16th century, prior to the arrival of Europeans, Nicoya was the most important chiefdom of the North Pacific of present-day Costa Rica. Region The Nicoya region is located on the southern border of Mesoamerica, when it was occupied in 800 AD. C. by immigrant groups that come from the north, from the Valley of Mexico, and that have been under the domination of the Olmecs. These groups, known as Chorotegas, are installed in the Isthmus of Rivas, in Nicaragua, and much of the territory of Guanacaste, especially the Nicoya Peninsula, displacing cultur ...
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Intermediate Area
The Intermediate Area is an archaeological geographical area of the Americas that was defined in its clearest form by Gordon R. Willey in his 1971 book ''An Introduction to American Archaeology, Vol. 2: South America'' (Prentice Hall: Englewood Cliffs, NJ). It comprises the geographical region between Mesoamerica to the north and the Central Andes to the south, including portions of Honduras and Nicaragua and most of the territory of the republics of Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia. As an archaeological concept, the Intermediate Area has always been somewhat poorly defined. Because it was not home to ancient state societies but was predominated by early chiefdoms at the time of the Spanish conquest, it was sometimes regarded as a kind of cultural backwater that contributed little to the emergence of Pre-Columbian civilization in the New World. However, recent archaeological research has demonstrated that this part of the Americas had some of the earliest agriculture, potter ...
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Mesoamerican Mythology
Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area in southern North America and most of Central America. It extends from approximately central Mexico through Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and northern Costa Rica. Within this region pre-Columbian societies flourished for more than 3,000 years before the Spanish colonization of the Americas. Mesoamerica was the site of two of the most profound historical transformations in world history: primary urban generation, and the formation of New World cultures out of the long encounters among indigenous, European, African and Asian cultures. In the 16th century, Eurasian diseases such as smallpox and measles, which were endemic among the colonists but new to North America, caused the deaths of upwards of 90% of the indigenous people, resulting in great losses to their societies and cultures. Mesoamerica is one of the five areas in the world where ancient civilization arose independently (see cradle of c ...
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Tezcatlipoca
Tezcatlipoca (; nci, Tēzcatl ihpōca ) was a central deity in Aztec religion, and his main festival was the Toxcatl ceremony celebrated in the month of May. One of the four sons of Ōmeteōtl, Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl, the God of providence, he is associated with a wide range of concepts, including the night sky, the night winds, hurricanes, the north, the earth, obsidian, hostility, discord, rulership, divination, temptation, Jaguars in Mesoamerican cultures, jaguars, sorcery, beauty, war, and conflict. His name in the Nahuatl language is often translated as "Smoking Mirror" and alludes to his connection to Obsidian use in Mesoamerica, obsidian, the material from which Mirrors in Mesoamerican culture, mirrors were made in Mesoamerica and which were used for shamanism, shamanic rituals and prophecy. Another talisman related to Tezcatlipoca was a disc worn as a chest pectoral. This talisman was carved out of abalone shell and depicted on the chest of both Huitzilopochtli and ...
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Chira Island
Chira Island is a Costa Rican Pacific island located at the upper end of the Gulf of Nicoya it is also as Chira a district of the Puntarenas canton, in the Puntarenas province of Costa Rica. History Chira district was created on 28 September 1998 by Decreto Ejecutivo 27396-G. Geography Chira has an area of km² and an elevation of metres. It possesses an extensive inlet of seawater that is the result of a geological fault that has caused the land to submerge, leaving exposed only the tops of what were formerly low hills. These are the various islands that dot the Gulf, the largest of which being the Island of Chira - Costa Rica's second largest island. The Gulf of Nicoya separates Guanacaste from mainland Costa Rica and is fed by the Tempisque River. Chira Island lies just off San Pablo, Guanacaste. The island is also a district in Puntarenas Canton, Costa Rica. Ecologically, Chira contains the most intact biodiversity of tropical dry forest flora in Costa Rica, i ...
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Garabito Empire
The empire, domain or lordship of King Garabito was a vast territory controlled by Huetar King Garabito and that extended through most of the Central Valley of Costa Rica from the Virilla River (natural border with the also Huetar but smaller Señorío del Guarco) in modern San José to the Atlantic Slope in what is now the north of the country (Alajuela, Grecia and San Carlos mainly). Garabito's domain transcended the borders of the Western Huetar Kingdom where it had multiple vassal populations such as Coyoche, Abacara, Chucasque, Cobobici (possibly Corobicí), Cobux, Yurustí and Barva, and also included several submissive peoples but not incorporated into their kingdom; the Botos, Tises and Catapas. Although the exact location of its capital is unknown, it is speculated that it could be in San Ramón near where it made war raids against the botos. The empire was also an enemy of the also vast Kingdom of Nicoya, of ethnic chorotega unrelated to the huétares but with the ...
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Huetar People
The Huetares were an important indigenous group of Costa Rica, who in the mid-16th century lived in the center of what is now the country. They are also mentioned with the name of güetares or pacacuas. Huetares were the most powerful and best-organized indigenous nation in Costa Rica upon the arrival of the Spaniards. During the 16th century, various chieftains dominated from the Costa Rican Atlantic coast to the Atlantic Slope. The Spanish chronicles mention a myriad of towns and the kings that ruled them, among them the Garabito Empire, located on the Central Atlantic Slope and the Tárcoles River basin, to the Virilla River and the Cordillera Central; the Kingdom of Pacaca, in the current canton of Mora, and the Lordship of el El Guarco, in the current Guarco Valley, in the Cartago Province, to the plains of the Central Caribbean and Chirripó. Their culture belonged to the Intermediate Area, and it stood out mainly for their works in stone, such as metates, sculptures, ...
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Nahuatl
Nahuatl (; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahua peoples, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller populations in the United States. Nahuatl has been spoken in central Mexico since at least the seventh century CE. It was the language of the Aztec/ Mexica, who dominated what is now central Mexico during the Late Postclassic period of Mesoamerican history. During the centuries preceding the Spanish and Tlaxcalan conquest of the Aztec Empire, the Aztecs had expanded to incorporate a large part of central Mexico. Their influence caused the variety of Nahuatl spoken by the residents of Tenochtitlan to become a prestige language in Mesoamerica. After the conquest, when Spanish colonists and missionaries introduced the Latin alphabet, Nahuatl also became a literary language. Many chronicles, grammars, works of poetry, administrative docu ...
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Spaniards
Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance peoples, Romance ethnic group native to Spain. Within Spain, there are a number of National and regional identity in Spain, national and regional ethnic identities that reflect the country's complex History of Spain, history, including a number of different languages, both indigenous and local linguistic descendants of the Roman Empire, Roman-imposed Latin language, of which Spanish language, Spanish is the largest and the only one that is official throughout the whole country. Commonly spoken regional languages include, most notably, the sole surviving indigenous language of Iberia, Basque language, Basque, as well as other Latin-descended Romance languages like Spanish itself, Catalan language, Catalan and Galician language, Galician. Many populations outside Spain have ancestors who Spanish diaspora, emigrated from Spain and share elements of a Hispanic culture. The most notable of these comprise Hispanic America in the Western Hemisp ...
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Universidad De Costa Rica
The University of Costa Rica (Spanish: ''Universidad de Costa Rica,'' abbreviated UCR) is a public university in the Republic of Costa Rica, in Central America. Its main campus, Ciudad Universitaria Rodrigo Facio, is located in San Pedro Montes de Oca, in the province of San José. It is the oldest and largest institution of higher learning in Costa Rica, originally established as the ''Universidad de Santo Tomás'' in 1843. It is also the most important research university in the country and Central America and is counted among the most prestigious universities of Latin America. Approximately 45,000 students attend UCR throughout the year. History The first institution dedicated to higher education in Costa Rica was the ''University of Saint Thomas'' (''Universidad de Santo Tomás''), which was established in 1843. That institution maintained close ties with the Roman Catholic Church and was closed in 1888 by the progressive and anti-clerical government of President Ber ...
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Tilarán
Tilarán is a small town and a district in Guanacaste Province in Costa Rica. It is the seat of the Tilarán Canton located in the hills overlooking the west shore of Lake Arenal. It is connected by road to El Silencio, and by the 142 road down through the Cordillera de Tilarán hills to Tejona. The area between Tilaran and Tejona is one of the most important wind farms in Costa Rica and turbines are prominent on the landscape. Animal husbandry also forms an important part of the local economy. Geography Tilarán has an area of km² and an elevation of metres. Locations * ''Barrios'': Cabra, Carmen, Juan XXIII, Lomalinda * ''Poblados'': Cuatro Esquinas, Chiripa, Piamonte, Río Chiquito, San Luis, Tejona, Tres Esquinas Demographics For the 2011 census, Tilarán had a population of inhabitants. The main religion is Roman Catholicism and the town lies at the center of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tilarán. Transportation Road transportation The district is covered ...
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Tempisque River
The Tempisque River, or Río Tempisque, is long, located entirely in Costa Rica flowing from the Guanacaste Cordillera near the Orosí Volcano and emptying into the Gulf of Nicoya. It passes through the Palo Verde National Park and is an important habitat for various species of crocodiles, monkeys, iguanas and birds. The river is heavily silted, limiting navigation to shallow crafts that can cross the muddy flats. Tidal conditions dictate the timing to cross the bar at the river mouth. Historically the Tempisque was used to float logs down to the sea. The logs were gathered at Chira Island to be loaded on ships. The Tempisque River Bridge was built linking the Nicoya Peninsula to southern Guanacaste and hence significantly cut travel time to San José. It was funded by a gift from the Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the ...
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