PANAMA, GULF OF

Spanish Golfo De Panam, inlet of the Pacific Ocean, bordering the southern side of the Isthmus of Panama. It is 115 miles (185 km) across at its widest point and 100 miles (160 km) long. The gulf is relatively shallow and separates the mountain ranges of western Panama from the beginning of the Colombian Serrana de Baud. Its western part is indented as Parita Bay, its northern as the Bay of Panama, and its eastern as San Miguel Gulf. The Pearl Islands, which have important fisheries, are in the gulf, and Panama City is the main urban centre on the gulf shore. History Exploration, conquest, and settlement In 1501 the Spaniard Rodrigo de Bastidas, in the company of Juan de la Cosa and Vasco Nez de Balboa, was the first European to explore the Atlantic coast of the Isthmus of Panama. In 1510 Diego de Nicuesa, another Spanish explorer, established the settlement of Nombre de Dios at the mouth of the Chagres River, and to the southwest, Alonso de Ojeda founded San Sebastian de Urab. The colony, facing fierce resistance from local Indian tribes, was moved at the instigation of Balboa. The new site was to the northeast, across the Atrato River, and was named Santa Mara de la Antigua del Darin. It became the first permanent settlement on the isthmus and the focus of jealous intrigues centring around Balboa. As head of the colony, Balboa, by the use of persuasion and force, brought most of the Indians under submission. Some of them revealed to him that a large sea and a gold-rich empire existed to the south, which perhaps was that of the Inca. In September 1513, Balboa reached the sea and claimed the Pacific Ocean for his king. Returning to Santa Mara in January 1514, he encountered much resistance from the Indians. Five years afterward Balboa was executed for insurrection on orders of the new governor, Pedro Arias de vila, known as Pedrarias Dvila, the Cruel, who had distrusted Balboa and feared his rivalry. In 1519 the population of Santa Mara moved to the new town of Panama (the first European settlement on the west coast of the hemisphere), which became the centre of commercial activity and the springboard for the conquest of Peru. The colony became an important part of Spain's mercantile system, attaining the rank of audiencia in 1538. Nombre de Dios, which was resettled and linked to Panama town by road, was renowned for its ferias (grand markets, or trade fairs). With the final destruction of Nombre de Dios in the late 16th century by the Englishman Francis Drake, commercial activity was moved to the hamlet of Portobelo, overlooking the calm bay recorded by Christopher Columbus in 1502. Portobelo then became a centre of Spanish commerce in the New World and the site of great ferias. Panama town and Portobelo continued to attract the attention of English raiders, however, and disastrous consequences befell both settlements. Henry Morgan destroyed Panama town in 1671, and Admiral Edward Vernon razed Portobelo in 1739. In the year of Vernon's raid, the colony was reduced in status when Spain abolished the Audiencia of Panama and placed its territory within the Viceroyalty of New Granada. Portobelo was rebuilt in 1751, but by then the Spanish galleons had begun to use the route around Cape Horn, accelerating the city's decline through loss of trade. In 1673 the town of Panama was rebuilt a few miles west of the old town. By 1793 it was the principal town on the isthmus, with more than one-tenth of Panama's civilian population of 71,888. Secession from Spain and union with Gran Colombia As the agitation for independence grew elsewhere in Spanish America, Panama, dependent on seaborne trade and relatively isolated from mutinous colonies, did not join the insurrection. The viceroy moved his headquarters from Quito (now in Ecuador) to Panama town, which sent deputies to the Cortes (parliament) in Cdiz, Spain, during the Napoleonic Wars. When the Spanish merchants secured the revocation of the royal decree authorizing foreign trade, Panama changed sides. In the autumn of 1821 the colony seceded from Spain and joined the Gran Colombia union. For a time Panama enjoyed the right to elect its own governor, but in 1843 a new constitution returned that power to officials in Bogot. Soon afterward Panama became a state within Colombia and, despite numerous efforts to break away, remained so for the rest of the century.