Editing Costa Rica (section)

=== Spanish colonization ===
The name {{lang|es|la costa rica}}, meaning "rich coast" in the Spanish language, was in some accounts first applied by [[Christopher Columbus]], who sailed to the eastern shores of Costa Rica during his final voyage in 1502,<ref name="embassy">{{cite web | title=About Costa Rica | work=Embassy of Costa Rica in Washington DC | url=http://www.costarica-embassy.org/index.php?q=node/19 | access-date=18 September 2012 | archive-date=26 July 2012 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120726030431/http://costarica-embassy.org/index.php?q=node/19 | url-status=live }}</ref> and reported vast quantities of gold jewelry worn by natives.<ref name="lp">{{cite web | title=History of Costa Rica | work=Lonely Planet | url=http://www.lonelyplanet.com/costa-rica/history | access-date=18 September 2012 | archive-date=21 January 2013 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130121150312/http://www.lonelyplanet.com/costa-rica/history | url-status=dead }}</ref> The name may also have come from conquistador [[Gil González Dávila]], who landed on the west coast in 1522, encountered natives, and obtained some of their gold, sometimes by violent theft and sometimes as gifts from local leaders.<ref>{{cite book | author=Rojas, Eugenia Ibarra | title=Fronteras etnicas en la conquista de Nicaragua y Nicoya: entre la solidaridad y el conflicto 800 d.C.-1544. | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IAcx6DtZba4C&dq=gil+gonzalez+davila+costa+rica&pg=PA89 | publisher=Universidad de Costa Rica. | year=2001 | isbn=9789977676852 | access-date=19 March 2023 | archive-date=4 April 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230404075152/https://books.google.com/books?id=IAcx6DtZba4C&dq=gil+gonzalez+davila+costa+rica&pg=PA89 | url-status=live }}</ref>

[[File:Iglesia Inmaculada Concepcion Ujarras.jpg|thumb|The {{lang|es|[[Ujarrás]]|italic=no}} historical site in the Orosí Valley, [[Cartago province]]. The church was built between 1686 and 1693.]]
During most of the colonial period, Costa Rica was the southernmost province of the [[Captaincy General of Guatemala]], nominally part of the [[New Spain|Viceroyalty of New Spain]]. The captaincy general was a largely autonomous entity within the [[Spanish Empire]]. Costa Rica's distance from the capital of the captaincy in [[Guatemala]], its legal prohibition under [[mercantilism|mercantilist]] Spanish law from trade with its southern neighbor Panama, then part of the [[Viceroyalty of New Granada]] (i.e. [[Colombia]]), and lack of resources such as gold and silver, made Costa Rica into a poor, isolated, and sparsely-inhabited region within the Spanish Empire.<ref>{{cite book | title= Claudia Quirós. La Era de la Encomienda. Historia de Costa Rica. Editorial de la Universidad de Costa Rica. 1990.}}</ref> Costa Rica was described as "the poorest and most miserable Spanish colony in all America" by a Spanish governor in 1719.<ref><!--?REPEAT1?-->{{cite book |author=Shafer, D. Michael |title=Winners and losers: how sectors shape the developmental prospects of states |url=https://archive.org/details/winnerslosershow00shaf |url-access=registration |publisher=Cornell University Press |location=Ithaca, N.Y. |year=1994|isbn=978-0-8014-8188-8}}</ref>