Roofing in Belize

Belize, on the Caribbean coast of Central America, has a hot, humid climate, a low-lying coast and a long history of hurricane damage. Its roofing traditions combine Maya pole-and-thatch building, the thatched houses of Garifuna coastal villages, and the timber buildings of the British colonial period, most now roofed in corrugated metal or concrete.

Climate and hazards

• Hurricanes. Hurricane Hattie in 1961 killed 307 people in what was then British Honduras. The governor estimated that 70% of the buildings in Belize City were damaged; most of the city's wooden buildings were destroyed and the storm tore the roofs off many others. The disaster led the government to build a new inland capital, Belmopan, completed in 1970.
• Heavy rain and humidity, which shorten the life of thatch and timber.
• Storm surge and flooding on the low coast.

Roofing history

Maya period. Belize was part of the Classic Maya heartland. Archaeologists Heather McKillop and E. Cory Sills, writing about the waterlogged Paynes Creek salt works in southern Belize, describe pole-and-thatch buildings as probably the dominant construction of the prehistoric Maya area. At the site of Ek Way Nal, 68 of 140 identified building posts were of palmetto palm (Acoelorraphe wrightii), with others of mangrove, buttonwood, Santa María (Calophyllum brasiliense) and rosewood; canoes probably carried posts and palm thatch to the salt works.

Garifuna settlement. The Garifuna, about a quarter of whom were deported to the island of Roatán in 1797, later settled along the Central American coast. A larger migration to Belize in the early 19th century is marked each year on Garifuna Settlement Day, 19 November; Dangriga is the centre of Belize's Garifuna community.

Colonial and modern. Belize City was built largely of timber before Hattie destroyed most of its wooden buildings. Reinforced concrete and corrugated metal sheet are now common for houses and public buildings.

Traditional and vernacular roofs

• Maya thatch (see Maya thatched house). In Toledo District, two palms are used. Bay leaf palm, a slow-growing understorey palm found only in well-forested areas, gives a durable roof but may take up to ten years to produce usable leaves and is becoming scarce. Cohune palm, common on disturbed land, is cheaper but less durable. Cutters need permission from the village and the Forest Department. Cohune fronds are split along the midrib and bundled in threes to fives; bay leaf fans are folded into a broom shape and woven onto the frame.
• Garifuna houses: wooden or wattle-and-daub houses with thatched roofs, the wooden ones raised several feet on posts.
• Raised timber houses on posts in towns, with metal roofs.

Roofing today

Corrugated metal sheet and concrete slabs are the common roofs of modern housing, with thatch surviving in Maya villages and widely used on tourist cabañas and beach shelters (see palapa).

Notable roofs

• Maya sites such as Paynes Creek, where submerged wooden posts of thatched buildings survive.

Local roofing terms

• Bay leaf and cohune: the two main thatch palms.
• Naj: house in Mopan Maya.