The first chapters of a history of Latin America belong to its inhabitants before their first contact with Europeans. This is especially true in Mesoamerica. Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and, to a lesser degree, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, like Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia in the Central Andes, have roots deeply embedded in the subsoil of their pre-Columbian civilizations. The aims of this chapter are, first, to outline briefly the development of the peoples and high cultures of Mesoamerica before the settlement of the Mexicas (Aztecs) in the Valley of Mexico (c. 1325); secondly, to examine the main features of political and socio-economic organization and artistic and intellectual achievement during the period of Mexica (Aztec) pre-eminence (fourteenth and fifteenth centuries); and, thirdly, to present an overview of the prevailing situation in Mesoamerica on the eve of the European invasion (1519).

Situated between the solid continental land masses of North and South America, Mesoamerica (an area of 350,000 square miles) has a distinctly isthmian character with several conspicuous geographical features like the gulfs of Tehuantepec and Fonseca on the Pacific side, and the Yucatan peninsula and the gulf of Honduras on the Caribbean side. This area, where the high cultures developed, probably exhibits greater geographical and ecological diversity than any other region of similar size in the world. The region has a complex geological history. In particular, recent mountain building and volcanic activity, including the formation of two volcanic axes (one running east-west along the southern limits of the Valley of Mexico and the other following a north-west, south-east orientation through Mexico and Central America), have played important roles in the formation of distinct natural regions.