Historedia
Episode 1 of 1

Visit to Copán

When
1839-1840
Where
Maya site in western Honduras
Part of
Archaeological excavation at Copán begins

Stephens and Catherwood first came across Maya ruins at Copán, having landed in British Honduras, during their 1839-1840 expedition.

The expedition came together in 1839 and continued through the following year. Stephens and Catherwood visited Copán, producing a description, map, and detailed drawings. These materials were later published in 1841 in Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatán.

Sources

  1. Frederick Catherwood Wikipedia, revision of 2026-08-03
  2. John Lloyd Stephens Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-23
  3. Copán Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-27

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.