Nicaragua

From the Nicarao and the colonial rival cities of León and Granada to a republic shaped by intervention, revolution, and contested power.

Nicaragua takes its name from the Nicarao, one of the indigenous peoples the Spanish encountered on its Pacific lowlands alongside the Chorotega. From 1524 the conquistador Francisco Hernández de Córdoba founded León and Granada, the rival cities whose Liberal and Conservative elites would dominate national politics for generations, while the Caribbean Mosquito Coast developed separately under British influence. Independence from Spain came on 15 September 1821 and, after the short-lived Federal Republic of Central America, Nicaragua endured the filibuster William Walker, repeated United States intervention, Augusto César Sandino's resistance, and the long Somoza family dictatorship. The Sandinista Revolution of 1979 and the Contra war of the 1980s defined the modern era, followed by a democratic interlude after 1990 and the return and consolidation of power under Daniel Ortega to the present.