A veritable treasure of scientific observations has been lying in Denmark's Botanical Library since the late 18th century. It is the seven-hundred page manuscript of a Latin diary entitled Diarium Surinamicum (DS) that Carl Linnaeus' young associate Daniel Rolander (1725-1793) wrote during his research expedition from Uppsala, Sweden, to the Dutch colony of Surinam from 1754 until his return in 1756. DS is an ethnographic, botanical, and geographic description of Surinam in 1755 and 1756, including observations of flora, fauna, local and European inhabitants, the land, trade, etc. There are numerous fascinating ethnographic observations on the aboriginals, the imported slaves, and the European colonists. Rolander goes into great detail in describing how the slaves live, how they managed a successful revolt, how they formed an independent community deep in the mountainous jungles, how they keep their native traditions alive, what sort of language they speak, and - perhaps most spectacular of all - how they tested and ascertained the medicinal qualities of plants in the Surinamese jungle. The publication of DS will therefore make a unique contribution to Linnean scholarship and open a long-neglected window directly into the culture and scientific history of South America. This project aims to provide: (1) a critical, historic edition of the manuscript; (2) a complete inventory of potential and identified Rolander materials (the herbarium and insect collection) in Denmark's Botanic Library, and the Swedish Museum of Natural History; (3) a colour digitalisation of the DS manuscript and related materials; and (4) the production of a scientific and scholarly commentary on the flora, fauna, people, and places named in DS.