Belize, formerly known as British Honduras, remained a British colony until 1981, making it the last mainland territory in Central America to gain independence, and its colonial history has left English as the country’s official language, a distinct linguistic outlier among its entirely Spanish-speaking Central American neighbours. That British colonial history also shaped Belize’s legal and educational systems along British lines, giving the small nation a genuinely distinct cultural identity within the region despite its geographic position firmly within Central America.
The Belize Barrier Reef, running along most of the country’s Caribbean coastline, is part of the larger Mesoamerican Barrier Reef, the second-largest coral reef system in the world, and was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996, its waters home to the Great Blue Hole, a nearly perfectly circular marine sinkhole made famous internationally after being explored and popularised by Jacques Cousteau in the 1970s.
A Small Nation Shaped by an Older Maya Civilisation
Belize sits within the historic heartland of the ancient Maya civilisation, and the country holds significant Maya archaeological sites, including Caracol, once a city larger in population than modern Belize City, and Xunantunich, whose central pyramid remains one of the tallest Maya structures in the country. This deep Maya heritage predates Belize’s colonial and national history by well over a thousand years, and a significant Maya population continues to live in the country today, maintaining traditions that stretch back to this earlier civilisation.
Belize’s mainland is bordered by dense rainforest and river systems that remain sparsely populated relative to the rest of Central America, giving the country one of the lowest population densities in the region and a correspondingly significant role in Central American conservation efforts.
Painting Reef Waters and Jungle Coastline
Belize’s clear turquoise reef waters against dense tropical coastline give a watercolourist vivid colour and rich green texture to work with. We’ve captured that character in our own Belize Watercolor Print, painted first by hand and printed to order on archival paper, a small piece of Central America for a wall at home.
Shaped by an ancient Maya civilisation long before it was shaped by British colonial rule, Belize remains a nation whose small size holds a genuinely layered history.