Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Brief history
The Darién bore witness to some of the bloodiest confrontations between the invading con-
quistadors, greedy for gold and power, and the indigenous groups desperate to defend their
territories, most notably at
Santa María La Antigua del Darién
, the first successful Span-
ish settlement on the mainland since the time of Columbus (over the border in present-day
Colombia). Balboa took Santa María in 1510, and later intercepted an attempt to reclaim the
city, led by Cacique
Cémaco
, a pivotal figure in the indigenous resistance; he captured all the
alliance's chiefs, bar Cémaco, and had them hanged as an example. It is perhaps only fitting
that Balboa, who first espied the Pacific from the Darién, also met his end here - beheaded
by Pedrerías Dávila in the coastal town of Acla (in present-day Guna Yala) - while Santa
María was eventually abandoned by the Spanish in favour of Panama City, and was razed to
the ground by indigenous forces in 1524.
The region's population
The indigenous peoples most in evidence today are the
Emberá
and
Wounaan
. Both groups
may have migrated from the Chocó regions of Colombia (which is why they are often re-
ferred to collectively as Chocós).
Guna
presence is still recalled in some of the place names,
notably the snaking Río Tuira, and though most Guna moved to the Caribbean coast, pockets
remain in the more recently formed
comarcas
of Madugandi and Wargandi, and in isolated
communities in Panama and Darién provinces. The other substantial population, dominant in
the regional capital of La Palma and in settlements lining the Golfo de San Miguel, are the
Afro-Darienites
, descendants on the whole of the
cimarrones
- escaped slaves brought over
by the Spanish, who fled and waged warfare from their own strongholds (
palenques
) in the
rainforest, forming strategic alliances with pirates and indigenous tribes. Some of their com-
munities are now mixed with Emberá and Wounaan, and in some parts with
Afro-Colombian
refugees
, escaping the civil conflict across the border. The completion of the Interamericana
to Yaviza in 1979 opened the floodgates to
colonos
(the name often given to migrating
mes-
tizo
cattle ranchers and farmers predominantly from the Azuero Peninsula), who have now
cleared vast tracts of land along the highway for pasture, and constitute around fifty percent
of the total population of Darién province.
Local conflicts
Though the joint Comarca Emberá-Wounaan was established in 1983, covering around 25
percent of Darién province, there have been increasingly violent clashes with
mestizo
settlers
encroaching on their lands, while overlap with the national park, whose regulations restrict
traditional hunting and agricultural practices, fuel frictions between indigenous communities
and government.
