In Historia urbana de Panamá la Vieja, Alfredo Castillero Calvo builds on four decades of research on colonial Panama to write a masterful economic, social, and cultural history of Panama City’s sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Founded in 1519, Panama was one of the first Spanish cities on the Spanish mainland. It served as the departure point for the conquest of Peru and became an important center of imperial trade in European merchandise and Peruvian silver. Given its economic and strategic importance, the study of Panama City has received remarkably little attention. Castillero’s book does justice to this topic and, alongside the recent studies of Havana and Lima by Alejandro de la Fuente and Alejandra Osorio, respectively, contributes to a richer understanding of colonial port cities and their place in the global culture and economy of the early modern era. These port cities played a crucial role in the creation...

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