New Caledonia's wake : expanding the story of Company of Scotland expeditions to Darien, 1698-1700

Although previous examinations of the failed 1698-1700 Company of Scotland initiative to establish a colony on the Isthmus of Panama have emphasized its impact on the political future of Great Britain, the endeavor also intruded into a broader spectrum of geography, commercial enterprise and sociopolitics. The thesis examines the wider reverberations of the effort across four continents. Ranging from interruption of the lucrative slavetrade to the creation of an unintentional diaspora to opportunities for new alliances among European powers to ramifications for the indigenous Cuna, the Company of Scotland intruded into events on the eve of the seventeenth century in ways far beyond those previously considered.