Mesoamérica is a cultural entity, inhabited by peoples who during the final years prior to the Spanish conquest lived in almost all of the territory of present-day Mexico, Belize, and parts of Costa Rica and Honduras. The northem boundary at the time, of the Spanish conquest began at the mouth of the Sinaloa river, in northwest Mexico, dipped southward to the central plateau of the terma River valley, and climbed north- eastwardiy to reach the mouth of the Soto la Marina river, in the present state of Tamaulipas. The southem limits ron from the mouth of the Motagua river, in Honduras, to the Gulf of Nicoya, in Costa Rica. This huge geographical regían, sharing common traits such as use of the "coa" or hoe, and an economy based on the cultivation of maize and other products, such as maguey, "chia", etc., has been subdivided into five cultural areas, according to particular styles that flourished and developed in each of them: the Central Highlands, the Gulf Coast, Oaxaca, the Mayan zone and Western Mexico