A New Voyage and Description of the Isthmus of America

1934

Journals G161 H2 Ser. 2 no. 73

Oxford: Printed for the Hakluyt Society

Lionel Wafer (c. 1660 -1705) went to sea for the first time in 1677 as a ‘loblolly boy’ or ship surgeon’s assistant. After returning home in 1679, he left again a month later, this time for Jamaica. From there, he boarded a buccaneer boat and became a ‘pirate surgeon’, sailing the Caribbean with notorious privateers like William Dampier and Bartholomew Sharp. In 1681, Wafer was seriously injured and he spent time recovering with the Cuna Indians on the Darien Peninsula (between Panama and Colombia). His New Voyage describes his experiences with them. Travel writer, Lillian Joyce, in her introduction to this volume, states that Wafer’s book ‘remains the most authoritative source of information concerning the native folk of south-east Panama’.