The Olmec, the first major civilization in Mexico (1500-400 BC), ate cocoa beans. They crushed the beans, mixed them with water, and added spices. The Olmec could be the first people that consumed chocolate.
A ritual beverage, chocolatl, containing cocoa beans, was shared during Mayan marriage ceremonies a few hundred years later. Christopher Columbus may have been the first explorer to bring cocoa beans to Europe from his fourth visit to the new world in the early 1500s.
The Spanish conquistador, Hernan Cortes, realized the commercial value of the beans and transported them to