Portal:Piracy

The Piracy Portal

Introduction

The traditional "Jolly Roger" flag of piracy

Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically intending to steal cargo and valuable goods, or take hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, and vessels used for piracy are called pirate ships. The earliest documented instances of piracy date to the 14th century BC, when the Sea Peoples, a group of ocean raiders, attacked the ships of the Aegean and Mediterranean civilizations. Narrow channels which funnel shipping into predictable routes have long created opportunities for piracy, as well as for privateering and commerce raiding.

Historic examples of such areas include the waters of Gibraltar, the Strait of Malacca, Madagascar, the Gulf of Aden, and the English Channel, whose geographic structures facilitated pirate attacks. The term piracy generally refers to maritime piracy, although the term has been generalized to refer to acts committed on land, in the air, on computer networks, and (in science fiction) outer space. Piracy usually excludes crimes committed by the perpetrator on their own vessel (e.g., theft) as well as privateering, which implies authorization by a state government.

Piracy, or pirating, is the name of a specific crime under customary international law and also of many crimes under the municipal law of many states. In the 21st century, seaborne piracy against transport vessels remains a significant issue, with estimated worldwide losses of US$25 billion in 2023, increased from US$16 billion in 2004. (Full article...)

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1724 engraving of Bonny from A General History of the Pyrates

Anne Bonny (likely died December 1733) was a pirate who served under John Rackham. Amongst the few recorded female pirates in the Golden Age of Piracy, she has become one of the most recognized pirates of the era, as well as the history of piracy in general.

Much of Bonny's background is unknown. The first biography of Bonny comes from Captain Charles Johnson's 1724 book A General History of the Pyrates. According to Johnson, Bonny was born in Ireland, the illegitimate daughter of an attorney and his servant. Bonny and her father later moved to Carolina, where she married a sailor. Although Johnson's version of events has become popular over the centuries, there is little evidence to support it. (Full article...)

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Map of early wokou raids (violet) and later Jiajing wokou raids (blue), with sea routes from Japan

The Jiajing wokou raids caused extensive damage to the coast of China in the 16th century, during the reign of the Jiajing Emperor (r. 1521–67) in the Ming dynasty. The term "wokou" originally referred to Japanese pirates who crossed the sea and raided Korea and China; however, by the mid-Ming, the wokou consisted of multinational crewmen that included the Japanese and the Portuguese, but a great majority of them were Chinese instead. Mid-Ming wokou activity began to pose a serious problem in the 1540s, reached its peak in 1555, and subsided by 1567, with the extent of the destruction spreading across the coastal regions of Jiangnan, Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong. (Full article...)

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Did you know?

... that Queen Eschiva and her children were kidnapped by the pirate Kanakes after her husband put a bounty on him?
... that a search engine for pirated books has been used to train large language models?
... that since 1904 the Gasparilla Pirate Festival in Tampa, Florida, has featured a pirate-themed parade?
... that Stephen Foster's best-selling song "Old Uncle Ned" made little money for him due to the many pirated publications circulating in the marketplace?
... that a 1526 pirate raid might have inspired a Maltese ballad about a bride being abducted from her wedding?
... that North Korea thanked the United States for helping its sailors defeat a group of pirates?

... that red Jolly Roger flags were the most feared of all; all prayed they never encountered the "Bloody Red," which boldly declared that no mercy would be shown and all victims would be killed?
... that English pirate Henry Every, who was sometimes known as Long Ben, was one of the few major pirate captains to retire with his loot without being arrested or killed in battle?
... that in 2011, pirates were reported as raiding along the Danube River in the center of Europe?

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Selected quotations

“

Now for our affair's are on the razor's edge, men of Ionia, wither we are to be free or slaves ... so if you will bear hardships now, you will suffer temporarily but be able to overcome your enemies

”

— Dionysius the Phocaean

More quotations...

General images

The following are images from various piracy-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Extent of pirate attacks on shipping vessels in the Indian Ocean between 2005 and 2010. (from Piracy off the coast of Somalia)
Image 2A contemporary flyer depicting the public execution of 16th-century pirate Klein Henszlein and his crew in 1573 (from Piracy)
Image 3British captain witnessing the miseries of Christian slaves in Algiers, 1815 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 4The Prisoner by Jean Lecomte du Nouÿ after Jean-Léon Gérôme, c.1871 (from Albanian piracy)
Image 5The Bombardment of Algiers by the Anglo-Dutch fleet in 1816 to support the ultimatum to release enslaved Europeans (from Piracy)
Image 6Barbary pirates were involved in the Barbary slave trade in North Africa (from Piracy)
Image 7Battle of Preveza, 1538 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 8A French Ship and Barbary Pirates by Aert Anthonisz, c. 1615 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 9Spanish warships bombarding the Moro Pirates of the southern Philippines in 1848 (from Piracy)
Image 101724 engraving of Bonny from A General History of the Pyrates (from Piracy)
Image 11The cemetery of past pirates at Île Ste-Marie (St. Mary's Island) (from Piracy)
Image 12Four Chinese pirates who were hanged in Hong Kong in 1863 (from Piracy)
Image 13A Sea Fight with Barbary Corsairs by Laureys a Castro, c. 1681 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 14A person costumed in the character of captain Jack Sparrow, Johnny Depp's lead role in the Pirates of the Caribbean film series (from Piracy)
Image 15Amaro Pargo was one of the most famous corsairs of the Golden Age of Piracy (from Piracy)
Image 16Battle of a French ship of the line and two galleys of the Barbary corsairs (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 17Aerial photograph of the Niger Delta, a center of piracy (from Piracy)
Image 18Conquest of Tunis by Charles V and liberation of Christian galley slaves in 1535 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 19Bartholomew Roberts' crew carousing at the Calabar River; illustration from The Pirates Own Book (1837). Roberts is estimated to have captured over 470 vessels. (from Piracy)
Image 20Slave market in Algiers, Ottoman Algeria, 1684 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 21Chinese pirate flag with the bagua and taijitu, captured by George Henry Preble. Circa 1871 (from Piracy)
Image 22A mosaic of a Roman trireme in Tunisia (from Piracy)
Image 23Double-barrelled lantaka cannons, kalasag shields, armor, and various swords (including kalis, panabas, and kampilan) used by Moro pirates in the Philippines (c. 1900) (from Piracy)
Image 24A fight between Filipino pirates, Bugis trading ship, and Dutch mariners. (from Piracy)
Image 25Map of Dalmatia in 1715 by Guillaume Delisle (from Albanian piracy)
Image 26Capture of the Pirate Blackbeard, 1718 depicting the battle between Blackbeard and Robert Maynard in Ocracoke Bay; romanticized depiction by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris from 1920 (from Piracy)
Image 27Map of Shkodër with the Buna river in 1571 by Giovanni Francesco Camocio (from Albanian piracy)
Image 28Pirate treasure looted by Samuel Bellamy and recovered from the wreck of the Whydah; exhibit at the Houston Museum of Natural Science, 2010 (from Piracy)
Image 29Blackbeard's severed head hanging from Maynard's bowsprit; illustration from The Pirates Own Book (1837) (from Piracy)
Image 30An Algerine pirate ship (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 31Map of Vlorë in 1573 by Simon Pinargenti (from Albanian piracy)
Image 32Barbaria by Jan Janssonius, shows the coast of North Africa, an area known in the 17th century as Barbaria, c. 1650 (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 33Views of Ulcinj in 1718 bz H. C. Bröckell (from Albanian piracy)
Image 34Anti piracy operations by Indian Navy's INS Tabar, in the Gulf of Aden on 18 November 2008 (from Piracy off the coast of Somalia)
Image 35U.S. naval officer Stephen Decatur boarding a Tripolitan gunboat during the First Barbary War, 1804 (from Piracy)
Image 36A private guard escort on a merchant ship providing security services against piracy in the Indian Ocean (from Piracy)
Image 37Born to a noble family in Puerto Rico, Roberto Cofresí was the last notably successful pirate in the Caribbean. (from Piracy)
Image 38Map of Ulcinj in 1573 by Simon Pinargenti (from Albanian piracy)
Image 39"Mic the Scallywag" of the Pirates of Emerson Haunted Adventure, Fremont, California (from Piracy)
Image 40Suspected Somali pirates keep their hands in the air (from Piracy)
Image 41A 19th-century illustration of an Iranun pirate (from Piracy)
Image 42Currimao Watchtower, Ilocos Norte. 'Currimao' comes from the Iloco term cumaws (pirates) and the Spanish word correr (to run), reflecting the warnings given by watchmen during pirate attacks. (from Piracy)
Image 43Kent battling Confiance, a privateer vessel commanded by French corsair Robert Surcouf in October 1800, as depicted in a painting by Garneray (from Piracy)
Image 44The Monument of the Four Moors by Pietro Tacca; Livorno, Italy (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 45A French ship under attack by Barbary pirates, ca. 1615 (from Piracy)
Image 46The Barbary corsairs frequently attacked Corsica, resulting in many Genoese towers being erected. (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 47A collage of Somali pirates armed with AKM assault rifles, RPG-7 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and semi-automatic pistols in 2008 (from Piracy)
Image 48Bombardment of Algiers by Lord Exmouth in August 1816, Thomas Luny (from Barbary corsairs)
Image 49Puerto del Príncipe being sacked in 1668 by Henry Morgan (from Piracy)
Image 50Cossacks of Azov fighting a Turk ship by Grigory Gagarin (from Piracy)