Rare 1699 Map of the Failed Scottish Colony of Caledonia in Panama

Name: Rare 1699 Map of the Failed Scottish Colony of Caledonia in Panama
Brand: American Maps and Prints
SKU: BG-14030
Price: 650 USD
Availability: InStock

$650

€580 · dollar price at today's exchange rate

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Shipping to the United States: $51 standard, $73 express, insured and tracked.

Date: 1699
Kind: Maps
Size: 46.4 × 39.5 cm (18.3 × 15.6 in)
Condition: Good. Very good condition considering the age, with clear impressions and light hand coloring. Margins are clean and the sheet has been professionally mounted in a neutral museum mat. Folding line as issued.
Period: Colonial America
Places: Central America
Reference: BG-14030

What the condition grades mean

Excellent: Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
Very good: Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
Good: Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
Fair: Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.

Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.

Guaranteed original. This is an original of the period stated, not a later reproduction or print-on-demand copy. If it is ever shown to be otherwise, we refund you in full.

Shipping to the United States. Sent from our gallery in Langweer, the Netherlands, flat between boards or rolled in a tube, and fully insured. Delivery and import charges.

About this piece

The Scottish colony on the Isthmus of Panama, "The Scots Settlement in America called New Caledonia, A.D. 1699," a copper engraving with hand color in outline, lettered "According to an original draught by H. Moll, geographer." The sheet is mounted in a cream mat.

The map covers the small stretch of the Darien coast where the Company of Scotland landed. A compass rose and rhumb lines cover the sea, with Golden Island at the top, Point Look Out at the right and the long curved shore of the Outward Bay of Caledonia opening into the Inward Bay below it. New Edinburgh is marked on the eastern peninsula, with Fort St. Andrew and the anchorage described nearby, and mountains are drawn in brown hill symbols along both shores. "New Caledonia" and "Darien" are lettered across the land. A title cartouche sits at the left, and a block of text at the upper right describes the bay, its depth and its good anchorage.

The Darien venture was launched in 1698 and failed within a few years, and the loss of money it caused is widely linked to Scotland's agreement to the Union with England in 1707.

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