Fonseca Bay

The Gulf of Fonseca is a sheltered Pacific inlet on the coast of Central America, bordered today by El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua. Its waters and islands lie among communities with histories older than Spanish rule; Lenca-speaking people inhabited the area of Conchagua Vieja on its western side at the time of contact.

In 1522 the Spanish expedition of Gil González Dávila and the pilot Andrés Niño reached the gulf. The Spanish name honoured Juan Rodríguez de Fonseca. Over the following decades, competing colonial jurisdictions struggled over the region, while its sheltered waters offered access to the Pacific coast. The name and later political boundaries belong to a history shared by the gulf's several shores.