The History of Piracy


Book Description

Much imitated but never surpassed, this chronicle ranges from ancient to modern times to explore the rise of piracy. A dramatic narrative and colorful characters complement its impeccable scholarship. 21 black-and-white illustrations.




Pirates


Book Description

Angus Konstam setssail through the brutal history of piracy, separating myth from legend and fact from fiction. Pirates takes us into the depths of the pirate’s dark world, examining the many colorful characters from Cretans and Vikings to French corsairs and the British rogues of the golden age of piracy, such as Blackbeard and Captain Kidd and even two women pirates, Mary Read and Ann Bonny, who became pregnant to avoid execution. A blood-soaked, riveting account, itprovides a complete history of the fearsome threat on the high seas from the marauders in the pages of antiquity to the Somali pirates in the headlines of today.




A History of Pirates


Book Description

The modern image of the pirate is derived from Captain Charles Johnson's accounts of the cut-throats who sailed under the Jolly Roger. It was he who gave mythical status to the likes of Blackbeard and Captain Kidd. Using contemporary sources, Nigel Cawthorne now turns the spotlight on the reality of pirate life, revealing the truth behind the legends. It gives us an insight into the men - and women - their weapons, their ships, their unhappy victims and their hide-outs, including the capital city of the pirate 'empire', Port Royal in Jamaica - known as the 'wickedest city in the world'.




The Golden Age of Piracy


Book Description

For thousands of years, pirates have terrorized the ocean voyager and the coastal inhabitant, plundered ship and shore, and wrought havoc on the lives and livelihoods of rich and poor alike. Around these desperate men has grown a body of myths and legends—fascinating tales that today strongly influence our notions of pirates and piracy. Most of these myths derive from the pirates of the “Golden Age,” from roughly 1655 to 1725. This was the age of the Spanish Main, of Henry Morgan and Blackbeard, of Bartholomew Sharp and Bartholomew Roberts. The history of pirate myth is rich in action, at sea and ashore. However, the truth is far more interesting. In The Golden Age of Piracy, expert pirate historian Benerson Little debunks more than a dozen pirate myths that derive from this era—from the flying of the Jolly Roger to the burying of treasure, from walking the plank to the staging of epic sea battles—and shows that the truth is far more fascinating and disturbing than the romanticized legends. Among Little’s revelations are that pirates of the Golden Age never made their captives walk the plank and that they, instead, were subject to horrendous torture, such as being burned or hung by their arms. Likewise, epic sea battles involving pirates were fairly rare because most prey surrendered immediately. The stories are real and are drawn heavily from primary sources. Complementing them are colorful images of flags, ships, and buccaneers based on eyewitness accounts. Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in history--books about World War II, the Third Reich, Hitler and his henchmen, the JFK assassination, conspiracies, the American Civil War, the American Revolution, gladiators, Vikings, ancient Rome, medieval times, the old West, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.




The Golden Age of Piracy in China, 1520–1810


Book Description

The Golden Age of Piracy in China, 1520–1810 exposes readers to the little-known history of Chinese piracy in the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries through a short narrative and selection of documentary evidence. In this three-hundred-year period, Chinese piracy was unsurpassed in size and scope anywhere else in the world. The book includes a carefully selected and wide range of Chinese, Portuguese, Dutch, English, and Japanese sources—some translated for the first time—to illustrate the complexity and variety of piratical activities in Asian waters. These documents include archival criminal cases and depositions of pirates and victims, government reports and proclamations, memoirs of coastal residents and pirate captives, and written and oral folklore handed down for generations. The book also illuminates the important role that pirates played in the political, economic, social, and cultural transformations of early modern China and the world. An historical perspective provides an important vantage point to understand piracy as a recurring cyclical phenomenon inseparably connected with the past.




A General History of The Pyrates


Book Description

‘A General History of the Pyrates’ is a captivating account of some of history’s most notorious pirates. The author, writing as Captain Charles Johnson, blends fiction and non-fiction to provide readers with a most entertaining version of these iconic heroes and villains. This book was a massive success upon its first release due to its adventurous stories filled with danger and treasure and its influence lives on to this day as it shaped the modern view of pirates. Some of the best accounts in the book are of the infamous Blackbeard and the trailblazing female pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read. ‘A General History of the Pyrates’ is the definitive story of the golden age of piracy and should be read by fans of books such as ‘Treasure Island’ and movies such as ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’. Daniel Defoe (1660 – 1731) is one of the most important authors in the English language. Defoe was one of the original English novelists and greatly helped to popularise the form. Defoe was highly prolific and is believed to have written over 300 works ranging from novels to political pamphlets. He was highly celebrated but also controversial as his writings influenced politicians but also led to Defoe being imprisoned. Defoe’s novels have been translated into many languages and are still read across the globe to this day. Some of his most famous books include ‘Moll Flanders’ and ‘Robinson Crusoe’ which was adapted into a movie starring Pierce Brosnan and Damian Lewis in 1997. Defoe’s influence on English novels cannot be understated and his legacy lives on to this day.




The Piracy Years


Book Description

The Piracy Years: Internet File Sharing in a Global Context is the first collection to provide an overview of digital piracy’s recent past and its potential futures. Combining research essays, interviews, and overviews, the volume brings together leading scholars and infamous digital pirates from China, Germany, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In June 1999, the peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing website Napster transformed the availability of online content, but the site was quickly sued into oblivion. Despite the highly publicised shutdowns of a number of P2P websites, many continue to thrive, and digital piracy has become a global phenomenon. This book argues that any future media theory and research will have to contend with such web practices remaining an integral and politically formative part of the Internet. Offline and online piracies thrive on technological affordances in opposition to corporate efforts – in music, film, publishing, and academia – to label them as threatening to the economy and society. Therefore, this book explores piracy as a phenomenon navigating the conventions, norms, and boundaries of legality in digital cultures. Pirate networked sociabilities work within and outside the fringes of market economy through the lens of institutional and discursive power. By creating new ways that keep society moving and from stagnation, they ensure its continued existence - including the survival of the very areas they attack. The Piracy Years is an essential resource for researchers, post-graduate students, and anyone interested in the global spread and ever-increasing importance of digital piracy.




Pirate Nests and the Rise of the British Empire, 1570-1740


Book Description

Analyzing the rise and subsequent fall of international piracy from the perspective of colonial hinterlands, Mark G. Hanna explores the often overt support of sea marauders in maritime communities from the inception of England's burgeoning empire in the 1570s to its administrative consolidation by the 1740s. Although traditionally depicted as swashbuckling adventurers on the high seas, pirates played a crucial role on land. Far from a hindrance to trade, their enterprises contributed to commercial development and to the economic infrastructure of port towns. English piracy and unregulated privateering flourished in the Pacific, the Caribbean, and the Indian Ocean because of merchant elites' active support in the North American colonies. Sea marauders represented a real as well as a symbolic challenge to legal and commercial policies formulated by distant and ineffectual administrative bodies that undermined the financial prosperity and defense of the colonies. Departing from previous understandings of deep-sea marauding, this study reveals the full scope of pirates' activities in relation to the landed communities that they serviced and their impact on patterns of development that formed early America and the British Empire.




Raiders and Rebels


Book Description

I he most authoritative history of piracy, Frank Sherry's rich and colorful account reveals the rise and fall of the real "raiders and rebels" who terrorized the seas. From 1692 to 1725 pirates sailed the oceans of the world, plundering ships laden with the riches of India, Africa, South America, and the Caribbean. Often portrayed as larger-than-life characters, these outlaw figures and their bloodthirsty exploits have long been immortalized in fiction and film. But beneath the legends is the true story of these brigands—often common men and women escaping the social and economic restrictions of 18th-century Europe and America. Their activities threatened the beginnings of world trade and jeopardized the security of empires. And together, the author argues, they fashioned a surprisingly democratic society powerful enough to defy the world.




Persistent Piracy


Book Description

Spanning from the Caribbean to East Asia and covering almost 3,000 years of history, from Classical Antiquity to the eve of the twenty-first century, Persistent Piracy is an important contribution to the history of the state formation as well as the history of violence at sea.




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