Before the British Empire took over the world, Scotland and England were competing colonial powers. Though the Scottish colonies were unable to find the same success their English rivals were, Scotland still made a concerted effort over decades to find its place among the European empires.

Sources:

The Scottish Empire, Michael Fry

Landsman N, 1999, “Nation, Migration and the Province in the First British Empire: Scotland and the Americas, 1600-1800”, The American Historical Review

https://www.scotsman.com/heritage-and...

Wagner J, 2022, “The First ‘British’ Colony in the Americas: Inter-kingdom Cooperation and Stuart-British Ideology in the Colonisation of Newfoundland, 1616-1640”, Britain and the World, Vol. 15, Issue 1