Pirates

YARR! Pirates have been around as long as there have been booty to plunder! We liek to drink rum and fight! It's all for dubloons and the win, matey!!

Do you like ta steal? Do you like the high seas? Do you know your way around a bottle of rum? Do you know how to tie a clove hitch? IF SO, THEN YOU MAY BE A PIRATE!

DO WHAT YOU WANT, CUZ A PIRATE IS FREE! YOU ARE A PIRATE!!!

History of Piracy

The history of piracy dates back more than 3000 years, but its accurate account depends on the actual meaning of the word ‘pirate’. In English, the word piracy has many different meanings and its usage is still relatively new. Today, some uses of the word have no particular meaning at all. A meaning was first ascribed to the word piracy sometime before the XVII century. It appears that the word pirate (peirato) was first used in about 140 BC by the Roman historian Polybius. The Greek historian Plutarch, writing in about 100 A.D., gave the oldest clear definition of piracy. He described pirates as those who attack without legal authority not only ships, but also maritime cities. Piracy was described for the first time, among others, in Homer's The Iliad and The Odyssey. For a great many years there remained no unambiguous definition of piracy. Norse riders of the 9th and 11th century AD were not considered pirates but rather, were called "Danes" or "Vikings". Another popular meaning of the word in medieval England was "sea thieves". The meaning of the word pirate most closely tied to the contemporary was established in the XVIII century AD. This definition dubbed pirates "outlaws" whom even persons who were not soldiers could kill. The first application of international law actually involved anti-pirate legislation. This is due to the fact that most pirate acts were committed outside the borders of any country.

Sometimes governments gave rights to the pirates to represent them in their wars. The most popular form was to give a license to a private sailor to attack enemy shipping on behalf of a specific king – Privateer. Very often a privateer when caught by the enemy was tried as an outlaw notwithstanding the license. Below we tried to outline a selective history of piracy, selective and arbitrary because there is so much that can be said about piracy and it is impossible to tell all.

Famous Pirates

One of the most well known Pirates of all times was Captain Kidd, who had originally been employed to rid the seas of pirates.

Kidd was born around 1645 (the exact date is unknown). He found employment as an English Privateer who found such success in New York and the West Indies that he was called back to serve England. The King’s officers asked Kidd to captain a new powerful ship: the Adventure Galley. The Adventure Galley was equipped with 34 cannons and a crew of 80. Its mission was to capture all French ships, and the pirates of Madagascar. Kidd accepted the proposition.

Kidd thought his ship could use a better crew so he recruited a gang of cutthroats in New York and sailed for Madagascar. Once there, a good portion of his new crew left Kidd’s ship in order to join the pirates. The remaining portion of pirates on Kidd’s crew, threatened him with mutiny, unless Kidd would attack any and all ships. Kidd refused. Mutiny was close at hand, and a fight between him and the ship gunner erupted. Kidd killed the man, and the crew did not pursue the revolt further; however, after that incident, Kidd was a changed man. Plundering ships of all kinds along India’s Malabar coast: Kidd had become a pirate. The holds of the Adventure Galley were already full when Kidd decided to plunder the Quedagh Merchant. The Quedagh Merchant was a huge treasure ship of 400 tons (the Adventure galley weighed only 284 tons). As the pirates approached the merchant, the captain of the vessel gave the sign of surrender; however, the captain of the merchant was secretly preparing for battle.

Sails were trimmed, sand was poured for better footing, ammunition was readied, and buckets were filled for fire fighting. As the pirates neared, the merchant vessel fired- but due to a sudden ocean swell, the shot missed its mark. The pirates immediately threw their grappling hooks, bringing the two ships together. The pirates rapidly boarded the ship, and soon Captain Kidd was in the possession of one of the greatest pirate treasures ever. With this final accomplishment under his belt: he ordered his crew to set sail for New York. Kidd thought he could fool the New Yorkers into believing that all his plunder had been taken only from French and pirate vessels.

Unfortunately for him, he was very mistaken: a great deal of the booty belonged to the powerful British East India Company. Kidd was clapped into chains and shipped to England were he was sentenced to death. Kidd experienced a terrible death: the hangman’s rope broke twice, the third time it held. Once Drake was dead: his body was dipped in tar and hung by chains along the Thames River. Kidd’s body served as a warning to all would-be pirates for years to come.

Count Maurycy Beniowski (also known as Baron Maurice de Benyowski) was born in Poland to a noble family. At that time Poland was partitioned into three parts, Beniowski was born in the Russian part. As a youngster he took part in the Polish uprising to liberate Poland from the Russian rule (Konfederacja Barska) and after being captured by Russians was sent into exile to Siberia. However he managed to escape and after some tumultuous years he found himself leading an armed expedition headed toward Madagascar. On an African Island near Madagascar he managed to establish a stronghold, and pronounced himself the king of Madagascar. We can easily classify him as a pirate because he was not above attacking shipping around lanes around Madagascar, and he didn’t represent any authority. One of the nearby islands (Mauritius) was named after this Polish adventurer and to this day he is remembered there.

Samual Bellamy, later to be called "Black Bellamy", was known to be one of the most active freebooters. As legend has it that he was a young English sailor, who traveled to the new world colonies to seek his fortune. He found a wealthy sponsor to finance an expedition South, to search for sunken Spanish treasure. This proved to be unsuccessful, and Bellamy returned home empty-handed, and married.

He soon however, left his wife and family behind in a town near Canterbury to sail the seas once more. As many notorious pirates before him, Bellamy served as an apprentice with Benjamin Hornigold, who was known for his generosity to prisoners, and reluctance to plunder English ships. Bellamy was elected as captain when Hornigold was deposed.

Bellamy proved to be a most successful pirate, mainly in the West Indies. He was known to entertain his crew with flowery orations, of which he considered himself quite the master. The concerned for the well-being of his prisoners, but he favored his crew’s well-being above all else, not to evoke any sinister feelings among them.

His growing carrier came to an abrupt end in April 1717, off Cape Cod, when his fleet was hit by an intense storm, completely capsizing and destroying his ship, the Whydah. Two men survived this tragedy, one disappeared in history, while the other, Thomas Davis, lived on to pass down the intense account of the shipwreck to Cape Cod folklore.

The Pirate Code

Code of Conduct on a Pirate Ship: The rules of each pirate captain were clearly stated to each member of the crew. There was little ambiguity about acceptable behavior among pirates on a typical pirate ship. When a rule was breached, the crew was often without pity or remorse in punishing a guilty crew member. Although in cases of particularly useful pirates such as skillful fighters, exceptions were inevitably made. Below, a sample code of conduct is provided. Outlined below is a sample.

Sample Code of Conduct:

Every man shall obey civil Command; the Captain shall have one full share and a half in all Prizes; the Master, Carpenter, Boatswain and Gunner shall have one Share and quarter.

If any man shall offer to run away, or keep any Secret from the Company, he shall be marroon'd with one Bottle of Powder, one Bottle of Water, one small Arm and shot.

If any Many shall steel any Thing in the Company, or game, to the Value of a Piece of Eight, he shall be marroon'd or shot.

If at any Time we should meet another Marrooner (that is Pyrate) that Man that shall sign his Articles without the Consent of our Company, shall suffer such Punishment as the Captain and Company shall think fit.

That Man that shall strike another whilst these Articles are in force, shall receive Mose's Law (that is 40 stripes lacking one) on the bare Back.

That Man that shall snap his Arms, or smoak Tobacco in the Hold, without a cap to his Pipe, or carry a Candle lighted without a Lanthorn, shall suffer the same Punishment as in the former Article.

That Man that shall not keep his Arms clean, fit for an Engagement, or neglect his Business, shall be cut off from his Share, and suffer such other Punishment as the Captain and the Company shall think fit.

If any Man shall lose a Joint in time of an Engagement he shall have 400 pieces of Eight; if a limb 800.

If at any time you meet with a prudent Woman, that Man that offers to meddle with her, without her Consent, shall suffer present Death.

Pirate Myths

Buried Treasure: Most experts on piracy tend to argue that maps to buried treasure are a work of fiction. They also believe that pirate would not have buried treasure on deserted islands. There are two sound reasons for not believing in buried treasure. 1) There has never been a legitimate treasure map found and 2) pirates tended to spend all their money as soon as they hit port and would return to pirating in order to raise more money. Probably the most famous treasure map is that of Captain Flint, the fictional pirate in Stevenson's Treasure Island. Almost every famous pirate captain has a legend about a treasure map to his secret stash of booty. Blackbeard and Black Bart both have several legends about buried treasure.

With that said, the romantic in me says that buried treasure may indeed exist. Some pirate managed to sack and pillage great amounts of gold and silver. I can't imagine a pirate with 10,000 pieces of eight to carry it with him everywhere he went. Where is he going to put the money? Would he put it in a Bank? Probably not. Would he trust his ship mates to watch it for him when he went to tavern? Probably not. Would he find a place to hide it? Yeah, probably. So maybe somewhere on some spit of land, or hidden in a grave yard, or perhaps in a isolated patch of land near an old port or river bank, a pirate buried a barrel or wooden chest with a bunch of doubloons inside. He probably wouldn't draw a map to where it was unless he knew he was going to die and was giving his shares to a partner.

So will you find "Flint's Treasure" amounting to all the riches he obtained over twenty years of pirating? Probably not. But is it possible to find a stash of 1,000 doubloons, or even a couple gold bars buried near an old pirate lair? I would say it is plausible but not probably after two hundred years. One thing would be certain; the pirate would probably hide the money where it was easy for him to get to it but not easy for others to find. He may also set a trap for suspicious fellows who might be in the area.

Cats: Seafarers were a superstitious lot. During the Golden Age of Piracy (and still today in some circles) Seafarers, considered the possession of black cats good luck. It was a common practice for the loved ones of a merchant marine to keep a black cat in the house while he was at sea. It was believed that so long as the cat was well fed and kept safe from harm, nothing would happen to the mariner.

Sailors also kept cats on board ships to bring them luck. Some of the superstitions involving sailors and cats claimed if the ship's cat approached a sailor, it meant good luck. If the cat approached halfway and turned away, bad luck would surely follow. If a cat was thrown overboard, a storm would rise and very bad luck would follow.

Polydactyl cats (cats with extra toes) were always a good thing on board ships. Sailors were long-known to especially value polydactyl cats for their extraordinary climbing and hunting abilities as an aid in controlling shipboard rodents. Some sailors also considered them to be extremely good luck when at sea. Today, such cats are found throughout England and the Eastern Seaboard of the United States!

If other seafarers believed this then there is no reason to doubt that a pirate or his lover would not hold the same beliefs.

On a more practical note, the cat would help keep down the rodent population. The cat on a ship is usually referred to as the "Ship's Cat".

Davy Jones Locker: Davy Jones' Locker is a nautical term that dates back to at least 1751 (first known written reference to the word). It is quite possible that the term existed orally among sailors before this date. Since it's first historical mention, the meaning of Davy Jones has changed very little. Davy Jones was sailor slang for the Devil or other evil spirits of the ocean. Davy's Locker or Davy Jones' Locker was the deep ocean's bottom. To be sent to Davy's Locker was to perish at sea. To send someone to Davy Jones was to kill him or her. It should be understood that a person going to Davy Jones usually was not going to Heaven.

The phrase Davy Jones appears in much of the popular nautical literature. There is no reason not to assume the term was common among sailors for many years. Other variations of Davy Jones' Locker are:

* To be in Davy's Grip: To be close to death, or frightened.
* To have the Davies or the Joneseys: To be frightened.
* To see you to Davy Jones: To threaten to kill some one.
* Awaken Davy or Awaken Davy Jones: To cause a storm .

Flying Dutchman: The Dutchman is a ghost ship that can never return to port for some reason. Its origins are unclear, being traced back to a novel, a play, short story and an opera. Most people attribute the ship to Dutch Captain named Bernard Fokke. Old Bernie had a habit of breaking his own speed records while sailing between Holland and the Dutch East Indies. People claimed he must have made a pact with the Devil in order to make his trips so quickly.

Well ol' Bernie ran into a tempest as he was rounding the Cape of Good Hope (tip of Southern Africa) but refused to give into the storm. As the storm worsened his crew begged him to turn around but he swore an oath and said he would sail through the storm even if it took him until judgement day. Needless to say the ship was lost with all hands aboard. (Which makes you wonder who managed to pass on the story about Fokke issuing the oath?) The story dates from as early as 1641. It bears a strange resemblance to early folktales of the Wandering Jew.

Since then, Flying Dutchman has made repeated appearances on Sponge Bob Square Pants, The Pirates of the Caribbean Trilogy, and numerous screen adaptations under the title Flying Dutchman or De Vliegende Hollander dating from as early as 1923.

Modern Day Pirates

Modern maritime piracy is a very real threat. The International Maritime Bureau, a division of the ICC Commercial Crime Services, reports an upsurge of pirate attacks off the coast of Somalia and in Brazilian ports.

Captain Jack Sparrow is a fictional character from the Pirates of the Caribbean universe who is portrayed by Johnny Depp. He was introduced in the film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003), and appeared in the back-to-back sequels, Dead Man's Chest (2006) and At World's End (2007). He is also the subject of a children's book series, Pirates of the Caribbean: Jack Sparrow, which chronicles his adolescent years, and the character's image was introduced into the theme park ride that inspired the films when it was revamped in 2006. The character has also appeared in numerous video games.

Sparrow is the Pirate Lord of the Caribbean Sea and can be treacherous, surviving mostly by using wit and negotiation rather than weapons and force; although he will fight if necessary, he tries to flee most dangerous situations. Sparrow is introduced seeking to regain his ship the Black Pearl from his mutinous first mate Hector Barbossa in the first film, and in the sequels, attempts to escape his blood debt to the legendary Davy Jones while battling the East India Trading Co..