History

It’s not surprising that the first legends or historical data that we have on the Canary Islands nearly always make some reference to Tenerife. It was also known as “Nivaria” –and you can imagine that the image of a huge snow capped mountain rising majestically from above the clouds and dominating the skyline for miles around must have greatly impressed those first ancient mariners.
 

The Guanches – pre-Hispanic inhabitants of Tenerife, dressed primitively in animal skins and hides, despite having no knowledge of the wheel they still worked with clay and their spears – añepas - were made from naturally sharpened volcanic rock.
Many ancient writers and even some modern ones – believe that the Canary Islands are the highest and last visible remains of the lost continent of “Atlantis” and that the Guanches are their direct descendants; children and grandchildren of a people that once inhabited the mountains of that legendary world until tragedy struck and they were suddenly and irrevocably destined to live as Islanders.
 

When the Spanish Conquistadors came to Tenerife, the island was divided into seven small kingdoms or “menceyatos”, each ruled by its own monarch or “mencey”.