A General History of Pirates

"Pirates Haunt Cocos" Montague Dawson

The Bay of Biscay, O!

     Thanks to several pirate films, video games, and even Broadway musicals; when people think of the sailors of the Golden Age of Piracy, they often think of pirates singing sea shanties as they sailed the open ocean. While most of the songs we may think of as having been in the pirate repertoire, most music attributed to pirates of the Golden Age of piracy didn't even exist yet. Music of late 18th and early 19th Century whalers recorded and published by sheet music salespersons would have been vastly different from the working songs of late 17th Century and early 18th Century sailors. Music of the age of pirates likely took more influence from West and Central African music as a result of the heavy presence of slavery in the Caribbean during the era than the whalers' songs of the following century. Known songs among sailors of the Golden Age of Pirates however included "The Bay of Biscay, O!," "When the King Enjoys His Own Again," and "The Ballad of Chevy Chase."

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"Cycladic Figure of the Goddess" Early Bronze Age

Bronze Age Collapse

     While the era of piracy in the Caribbean between the late 17th and early 18th Centuries may hold the title of the Golden Age of Piracy, one period of Mediterranean history holds the record for perhaps the most destructive era in naval history. During the 12th-9th Century BCE, civilizations across the Eastern Mediterranean were collapsing fast- and early sea pirates may have had something to do with that.

     There are still intense debates over where the unlabeled pirates came from, but these "Sea Peoples" entered the era at a time of intense political turmoil and took advantage of the era's faltering factions in order to raid coastal settlements in Anatolia, the Levant, and Egypt. Some historians believe these pirates came from their own crumbling homelands of the Minoans, the Mycenaeans, or even the city of Troy.

     Instead, much of the destruction attributed to the Sea Peoples may have been wrongly attested. During the era, there were several migrations and invasions with Dorians conquering several cities from the Mycenaean Greeks- driving countless Mycenaeans to find new lands in the Italian Peninsula. There were Libyan invasions of Egypt, Hittite invasions of Cyprus and Syria, and several of the latter invaded the Levant and Egypt to find new homes themselves.

     Raids on these locations have all been attributed to the "Sea Peoples," meaning the pirates of the oBronze Age Collapse were probably a combination of Mycenaean, Hittite, Syrian, and Libyan pirates who used the chaos of the era to pillage coastal settlements and- in some cases- attempt to find new homelands that would allow them to retire from piracy and found new settlements for their people in exile.

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"Anne Bonny and Mary Reed" [Unknown Artist]

Pillaging the Patriarchy

     The Golden Age of Piracy was filled with raiders, buccaneers, and smugglers- especially involved in the sugar industry and the slave trade. During the era, a handful of known women participated in piracy including Anne Bonny. Anne became a pirate at a young age to escape an abusive marriage to a Carolina merchant turned pirate James Bonny.

     Anne left her husband to join the crew of the more successful pirate "Calico" Jack Rackham and sailed with him for years. During the era, women in Europe lived under repressive gender norms that expected women to remain at home and tend to children and the hearth- something Bonny's father had not prepared her for. Anne's father disguised her as a boy throughout Anne's childhood in order to get her an education and work.

     Piracy was for several women of the era an opportunity to break with tradition and decide their own fate and place in the world. In an era ruled by stiff patriarchy, piracy was a rare and dangerous avenue in which women had some agency over their life story.

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"John Paul Jones seizing Lady Selkirk's silverware" [Unknown Artist]

John Paul Jones Is a Pirate

     Not all pirates were anarchists. Several smugglers, pirates, and raiders served as nautical mercenaries for established nation-states who depended on supplementary sailors to assist them in counter-piracy operations and traditional naval warfare. One such privateer was the smuggler John Paul Jones who served several countries throughout his career including Great Britain, the United States, and the Russian Empire.

     In 1999, the Jones' hometown of Whitehaven in the UK granted a pardon for the pirate's raid of the town during his time as a privateer for the United States during the American Revolution. The town even opened the port as one open to the US Navy as an honorary consulate.

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Tom Hanks is the Captain Now

Theatrical Release Poster

     Piracy is by far an issue of the past. Piracy off the coast of Somalia as well off the coasts of Southeast Asia have become serious obstacles to overcome for maritime shipping. One such incident involving Somali Coast pirates became the subject of a Hollywood film starring Tom Hanks; Captain Phillips.

     The film spotlights real-life maritime shipping captain Richard Phillips and his ordeal with Somali Coast pirates who boarded his vessel and attempted to hold the crew and cargo hostage. The film received strong acclaim from film critics, but the movie may not have told the whole story.

     The story paints the image of a heroic ship captain that outsmarts the pirates, calls in back-up from nearby anti-pirate operations vessels, and ultimately saves the ship's crew and cargo. The real life crew of the vessel however came forward with their own stories which countered the narrative.

     What is true- that the film truly depicted- was the overall outcome of the ordeal. As a result of the actions of the crew's officers including the captain and first mate, all crew members survived the attempted hijacking, all cargo reached port without damage, and the ship itself escaped to sail again.