Project created by and credited to:

Jones, Clint. (2018, June-July). Pirates and Critical Theory: An Immersive Course Design. 2018 NEH Summer Institute for Higher Education Instructors, "Thresholds of Change: Modernity and Transformation in the Mediterranean, 1400-1700," Hill Museum and Manuscript Library at Saint John’s University, Collegeville, Minnesota.

Abstract:This is a skeletal outline for a course on pirates and socio-political philosophy. The course is designed to be an immersive experience for students created through the use of role-playing games in conjunction with lectures, research assignments, and projects based on gameplay. The course is presented here with justifications for the framework and the design, explanations for altering or manipulating the course to fit other disciplinary perspectives and learning objectives, a basic game “design” prompt for each class, and a working model of a lecture for the first class. The course is designed to give students an opportunity to understand not only why pirates existed during the Golden Age (1650-1720) but how they did so.

Acknowledgements:

This project was completed with funding from the NEH and the sponsorship of the Hill Museum and Manuscript Library during the 2018 NEH Summer Institute "Thresholds of Change: Modernity and Transformation in the Mediterranean, 1400-1700,"  June - July 2018, Collegeville, MN. In addition to the instructors and participants, whose contributions during the institute helped inform the design of this course, the following people are deserving of special thanks: Dr. Kiril Petkov, Dr. Tim Ternes, Dr. Daniel Gullo, Dr. Robert C. Davis, Dr. Palmira Brummett, and Dr. Molly Greene.

Keywords and Tags: Philosophy, Pirates, Corsairs, Mediterranean, Atlantic, Role Playing Games, Buccaneers, Freebooters, Maritime predation, Piracy, Privateers, Syllabus, Social and Political, Utopia, Community Studies

Syllabus Pirates and Critical Theory

Disclaimer:

I have designed this course with philosophy in mind, that is, as a social and political philosophy course, but the course could easily be adapted to the needs of several disciplines requiring very minor adjustments to the design, content, or execution of the course. It could also be used ‘as is’ requiring the instructor to emphasize different aspects of the design for their own goals because to encapsulate the amount of content necessary to develop the socio-political philosophical themes I find pertinent I have utilized material inter-disciplinarily.

Course Concept:

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This course is designed to be a once a week seminar. The reasoning behind this is that the primary text of the class is a dice-based role-playing game (RPG) and is meant to provide an immersive experience for students across a range of themes that develop in the socio-political milieu of the early modern Mediterranean and Europe. The primary theme of the course is utopia, but important secondary themes develop ideas of social organization and hierarchy, religion, race, class, gender concerns, as well as historically important geopolitical issues that delineate how the period ought to be understood rather than how it is traditionally understood. That is, though the course material is situated in the trans-Atlantic and Caribbean theaters of operation dominated by European powers, the actual focus of the games lies outside the constructs of those entities and, more importantly, in opposition to them.

Selecting utopia as the dominant discourse of the class is merited for several reasons. First, the Age of Expansion and Exploration coincides with a utopian discourse that was increasing in cultural currency across Europe. In 1507 Francesco da Montalboddo collected into a single volume, Paesi Nuovamente Ritrovati, travel writings about the various “New Worlds” being discovered and explored. Beginning with the publication of Utopia by Thomas More in 1516, who was inspired by Montalboddo’s volume, the genre was re-defined for an audience already imbued with the imaginative possibilities of the “New World”. More’s Utopia was a stinging critique of English (and more generally European culture) but by modern standards it is far from ideal. However, it was followed by numerous publications and, as an idea, began reaching a broader audience as it began to show up thematically in popular culture. Shakespeare, for example, draws upon utopian themes, and François Rabelais’s Pantagruel (1532) includes an explicit nod to More’s novella. The beginning of the 17th century saw the publication, first, of Tommaso Campanella’s City of the Sun (begun in 1602 – last installment 1627) published in Calabria, Italy, German writer Johann Andreae’s Christianopolis (1619), Robert Burton’s “Democratis Junior to the Reader,” collected in Anatomy of Melancholy (1620), followed by Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis (1624) which develops the role of science in the functioning of society. Other English authors that wrote popular utopian tracts at the time include Samuel Hartlib’s Description of the Famous Kingdom of Macaria (1641) and James Harrington’s Oceana (1656) whose popularity would influence the intellectual design on the newly formed United States of America a little over a century later. Two other well-known utopias of the time were Cyrano de Bergerac’s Histoire Comique ou Voyage dans la Lune (1650) and Gabriel de Foigny’s Terra Australis Incognita (1676). Tracing the writing of utopia from More through the earliest tracts to appear in the first decades of the 18th century shows that the intellectual thrust of these imaginings increasingly moves away from religions underpinnings to scientific then secular and, finally, to rational questions about social organization thus mapping the rise of the enlightenment alongside the Golden Age of Piracy (1650-1720). The possibilities for re-creating society were stoked in the early modern imagination by the exotic tales that began showing up in literature and, one presumes, popular discourse as More’s influence spread—he was a major influence on Campanella—and sailors returned from destinations around the globe.

Second, pirates, despite their many failings, were pioneers in developing the idea of utopia not as an idea, but as a concrete practice. Pirates established several havens and hideouts that operated along the guidelines of a pirate ship and, thanks in part to Capt. Charles Johnson (possibly Daniel Defoe—there is a raging, perpetual, debate about this), the pirate utopia emerged in Madagascar as Libertalia (sometimes Libertatia). Johnson’s work, A General History of the Pyrates (1724) is

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snapshot biographies detailing the lives of famous pirates, collected in two volumes, that was an instant best-seller. Many of the character sketches he provides are of pirates that were well-known by reputation and their exploits were, for the most part, accurately chronicled. However, some of the pirates are most likely fictional and, because the authorship of the text is suspect, it may be that we will never know the motivation for including the fictional personages. Nevertheless, a clearly identified pirate utopia entered the cultural imagination. In order to sell such an idea, it would have to have been a popular idea among the target audience and one that would have been readily understood. Additionally, actual pirate havens like Tortuga and Nassau were exemplars that anyone familiar with piracy would have been able to associate with Libertalia. Comparably, Salé, on the Atlantic edge of Morocco’s coast, also boasted of being an independent pirate republic. However, the parallels to the utopian tradition are, in this example, strained by the ambiguous nature of ‘independent republic’ according to the status of the community in the larger Islamic controlled kingdom of Morocco. Nevertheless, Mediterranean readers were also primed for the utopian narratives of pirate communities both by their interaction with the idea from More forward and their proximity to the Barbary Coast.

Third, utopia requires work. Teaching utopia means that students must engage with creative play to parse out the key elements of a functional utopian community which means that they have to learn not only how to dialogue with others, but they have to rank order their desires and practice the art of compromise—just as real pirates would likely have had to do. Pirate societies on land were modeled after pirate society aboard ship and here, unlike more contemporary pirates, is an important feature of Golden Age Pirates. Golden Age Pirates lived at sea for long intervals, often moved between captains and crews, and required a socio-political structure that was as fluid as their lifestyle. Before setting sail in search of plunder pirates would draw up articles of agreement that determined everything from when and how often the musicians would play to how booty would be divided to punishments for failing to abide by the rules. Once these articles were drawn up each pirate was obliged to sign or make his mark upon the parchment as a concrete indication that he agreed with, and to abide by, the articles. This was known as ‘going on the account’ and it was literally the point of no return. This is an important feature of the pirate experience because captives taken with a prize were often given the opportunity to go on the account to avoid captivity or worse. In many ways to go on the account is very similar to the Mediterranean concept of ‘turning Turk’; being a renegade, whether one is doing it to avoid captivity and ransoming or because they have a hankering for adventure, was a practice familiar to Mediterranean citizens and, similarly, tales from people that went ‘on the account’ in the Atlantic abound.

Finally, pirate society contains all the elements necessary for a utopian discussion to take place. It was composed of various nationalities, it existed simultaneously nowhere and somewhere, it was a good place if you were a pirate in the community of pirates and, as we learned from Thomas More, utopia is not totalizing so everyone else is fair game—remember that More’s utopia includes slavery and warfare. The rules governing pirate life were drawn up democratically, and democratically enforced, captains could be voted out mid-voyage, pirates rarely attacked other pirates, disputes between pirates rarely ended in homicide, plunder was divvied up in an egalitarian manner, and pirates came from all social and class backgrounds, but those identities held little sway among the pirate community—that is, pirate society was largely merit based. These component parts make entry into the pirate’s world accessible for students,

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broad enough to cover a variety of topics and deep enough to cover important themes thoroughly without having to dedicated time to each one on the syllabus—as such, this class is designed to develop organically around the themes a class such as this should teach by allowing the students to experience those themes the way a pirate, as part of a crew, would.

However, as a class, and to make the RPG experience maximally rewarding, there is a need to establish the “ground” of the game beforehand. Hence, in the schedule provided below the first few class sessions are designed to provide students with the knowledge necessary to make them ‘good’ pirates. Afterward the assignments for the class are meant to prepare the students to experience the world as a reconstruction similar to what it would have been like to be a Golden Age Pirate. Each week the game play is meant to bolster students understanding of the focal areas covered the first few weeks and the projects assigned for assessment are designed to give the students opportunities for critical engagement with the time period but also ample opportunities for creativity and open-ended exploration of the era.

Potential Texts and Selected Readings:

Contextualizing the Mediterranean and Trans-Atlantic world of Golden Age Pirates:

*This represents only a partial list of sources that are possible candidates for material for this course. I provide below the sources that I draw from to craft the readings and lectures I use, but there are more I have omitted*

Bradford, Alfred, Flying the Black Flag: A Brief History of Piracy, (Westport, CT: Praeger,2007). *Several good overviews of pirate life and activities written in a literary style as opposed to an academic one. The book takes a long view of piracy (2000+ years) and is ultimately concerned with situating piracy in a broad context of (modern) terrorism so it should be used with caution as a biased source.

Cordingly, David, Seafaring Women: Adventures of Pirate Queens, Female Stowaways, andSailors Wives, (New York: Random House, 2001). *This book covers more than justpiracy, obviously, covering a variety of perspectives on the relationship women have hadwith the seafaring profession throughout history. The chapters of particular interest forthis course are 4 & 5.

---. Under the Black Flag: The Romance and the Reality of Life Among the Pirates, (New York:Random House, 2006). *This is easily one of the best books on separating fact frommyth and contains a wide array of useable material. The style of writing makes the book readable and approachable for students. The chapters are of a manageable length andeach focuses on specific areas of pirate life that pop up throughout the course. This textis indispensable for teaching a course like the one I have outlined here.

Exquemelin, Alexander, The Buccaneers of America, (Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 2000).*The quintessential book on Caribbean piracy. Exquemelin lived with and sailed withthe pirates he chronicles taking meticulous notes about the lives and activities. Thoughthe book itself has an interesting publication history, going through several competing

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printings as different countries modified the accounts to protect their reputations from thedepraved accounts put forth by Exquemelin, but the book was such a popular item theydared not forgo publishing it. The text is broken down into small, narrowly focused bits,that make it easy to pull from it what you need. It is an indispensable primary source andone that is necessary to capture the life of the pirates.

Gosse, Philip, The History of Piracy, (New York: Tudor Publishing Company, 1934). *Though this text is old, and also prone to bias or negatively skewed interpretations of pirates and piracy, it is a well put together book. The analysis of piracy is separated into sections that deal specifically with pirate regions—the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, the African coast, the South China Sea. It is easily readable and includes several useful maps and illustrations.

Hreinsson, Karl S. and Adam Nichols, The Travels of Reverend Olafur Egilsson: The Story of the

Barbary Corsair Raid on Iceland in 1627, (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University ofAmerica Press, 2016). *This is a short read that provides a first person, survivor account, of the corsair raid. Egilsson was let go by the corsairs because of his age and sent to raise ransom for the other captives. The first few chapters detail his experience of the raid and

his travels with the corsairs and the remaining chapters detail his travels around the Mediterranean attempting to get home to raise the money. As such, this text can be used

in a multiplicity of courses and, as a bonus, the editors have included corroborating source material and incredibly helpful interpretative material for understanding money, units of measure, and other culturally specific issues that may be foreign to students.

Johnson, Charles, A General History of the Pyrates, (Mineloa, NY: Dover Maritime Editions,1999). [ISBN: 978-0486404882] *Originally published in 1724, this book, like Exquemelin’s text, has an interesting history and debate about the authenticity of theauthorship is still on-going. This text is ideal for picking out a few pirate biographies forstudents to read to get a sense of what pirating was like, especially to an outside observer.However, because the original was published in two volumes and most reproductionsonly include the first volume, I have included the ISBN to the complete and unabridged version. This version is necessary for this class because the account of Libertatia is included in the second volume. Despite the utopian fiction and questionable sketchessurrounding some of the captains named and chronicled by Johnson, this is still an oftenreferenced historical source.

Konstam, Angus, The Pirate Ship, 1660-1730, (Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2003). *This is a well put together, concise, look at the various aspects of the pirate ship including how toconvert a prize to a pirate vessel. This text is excellent for providing the context studentswill need to capture and outfit their vessels for adventures on the high seas.

---., Piracy: The Complete History from 1300 BC to the Present Day, (Guilford, CT, 2011). * Though the title suggests an ambition that is destined to fail, this text is anexcellent introduction to the study of piracy. Moreover, the text provides overviews andnot in-depth scholarly study so it is a good source for providing frameworks around the

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time periods studied. Of interest to this course design are chapters 2-8 which cover the Medieval period through the end of Golden Age piracy and, subsequently, the end ofpiracy in the golden age sense. Konstam is an excellent writer, and a fine scholar, so hiswork is lively and engaging while providing the general overview of a complex topic.

Leeson, Peter, The Invisible Hook: The Hidden Economics of Pirates, (Princeton, NJ: PrincetonUniversity Press, 2009). *Whether you are teaching this class or one like it or not at allthis book is a must read. It covers the intricacies of pirate life through the lens of how a pirate economy worked. The topics range from the distribution of plunder to theeconomics of torture. This book can, and ought to, be used extensively in this class.

Malcolm, Noel, Agents of Empire: Knights, Corsairs, Jesuits, and Spies, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015). *This is a superb text and covers a lot of Mediterranean material quite well. A couple of chapters stand out for this course design, but overall this text could be used in any number of classes or course approaches that include or deal directly with the Mediterranean. For my purposes here, however, “Galleys and Geopolitics” is the important chapter.

Martin, John Jeffries, ed., Renaissance World, The, (New York: Routledge, 2007). *Several chapters of this text are pertinent to the design I have laid out here. However, the text is a wide-ranging field of topical analysis and could be utilized in numerous instantiations of this, or similar, courses. For my uses, Chapters, 6, 13, and 15. Of additional import is that each essay includes a bibliographic breakdown of primary and secondary sources and further readings.

Other Routes: 1500 Years of African and Asian Travel Writing, ed. Tabish Khair, Martin Leer,Justin D. Edwards, and Hannah Ziadeh, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005).*Relevant Chapters: Foreword, Introduction, Piri Reis: The Voyages of a “Corsair”, AnArab Cleric in South America.

Pirates in History and Popular Culture, ed. Antonio Sanna, (Jefferson, NC: McFarlandPublishing, 2018). *The most recent text dealing with the pirate in history and popularculture across a broad range of interests. Includes a chapter on pirates and utopia.

Rediker, Marcus, Villains of All Nations: Atlantic Pirates in the Golden Age, (Boston: BeaconPress, 2004). *Rediker is the fore most historian of piracy working today. This text is anabsolute must if you are going to teach this course, or some modification of it, with afocus on piracy. This book collects several of Rediker’s journal articles and, more importantly, it contains his chart showing the connections between various pirates atwork during the Golden Age.

Rogerson, Barnaby, The Last Crusaders: The Hundred-Year Battle for the Center of the World, (New York: Overlook Press, 2009). *This is a remarkable text for studying the Islamic world of the early modern period. It is well put together, focused and concise, incredibly readable. This text also includes a wealth of supplementary material that can be used in any number of courses. Of particular interest for this course design are the chapters

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“Barbarossa: The Emergence of Muslim Corsairs, 1480-1510” and “Corsair Kingdoms: The Barbarossa Brothers and Condottiere Andrea Doria, 1512-1534”.

Teonge, Henry, The Diary of Henry Teonge, ed. G.E. Manwaring, (New York: Routledge, 2014).*I recommend this less for its content than for its being an example of journaling which,as the core grading component of the course you are going to want to provide at leastsome example as to what you want. Use Toenge as a guide rather than a rule and youwill end up with some pretty good journals.

Wilson, Peter Lamborn, Pirate Utopias: Moorish Corsairs and European Renegadoes, (NewYork: Autonomedia, 2003). *This text focuses exclusively on the corsairs of the Golden age and is one of the few texts that includes a lengthy discussion of the independentMuslim controlled republic of Salé which will be helpful for students to be able toconceptualize the connections and parallels, as well as the disruptions between thenarratives of utopia in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean.

Wyeth, N.C., Marauders of the Sea, (New York: Putnam & Sons, 1935). *This book collects historical and fictional accounts of pirate exploits beginning with Odysseus and ending in 1914. However, the text could prove useful for a number of approaches to this course so I include it here. The chapter most relevant to this course design is “Some Adventures of an African Slaver”.

Potential RPG’s with some notes about strengths and weakness:

There are a couple of games that can accommodate this style of play and usage as a text. However, there are several options that I am not listing here, but which could be explored depending on how the game were being adapted to a particular class. Also, bear in mind that these games require specific dice sets. They are cheap and easy to get, Chessex being the best, and you can have your bookstore stock them as part of the course materials to make sure students can get them, but they are easy to get online and the benefit to having students buy their dice online is that they can find dice to their liking—they come in hundreds of colors and designs. They are also usually available at any game store.

1. 7th Sea—this is a very popular game system and one that is incredibly easy to master both from a teaching perspective and from an “I’ve never played before” student perspective. The biggest drawback to using this game is that it is set in a fictional world and it is not pirate focused—this is also a benefit if you are looking to do more than just piracy, like court intrigue. The world is based upon Europe and the Mediterranean using “nations” that are lifted right out of history. This game also includes several expansions and tie-ins that allow for the game to used to explore Far East, African, Caribbean, and “New World” themed theaters of play. The biggest benefit to this game is that it is story driven and not action driven so you can do a lot more in terms of stacking the deck with information and, for those who like to incorporate meta-questions into their courses, this game allows you to ask cool questions about construction of identity, biases, stereotypes, etc. in the construction of the game compared to history. What I mean by story not action driven is that the action sequences in the game are based around very basic rules and are not meant to be the prime focal point of the game the way combat often is in

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RPG style play. There is also the benefit that this games’ basic rules and overview of the worlds are free and available online.

2. Pirates of the Spanish Main—this game is by far the best game for playing in this course setting without any adaptation or manipulation. It is an easy system to learn and has the added benefit of being the by-product of a very popular table top game system of the same name. This game is also story driven and not action driven, but unlike 7th Sea, this game is set in the historical, and largely accurate, Caribbean world. This is, also, one of its drawbacks. The game is meant to be played as a pirates of the Caribbean game and often falls victim to the popular culture pirate and, given that it is fairly recent in the market of RPG’s it does not have a lot of expansion options. This also means that it will be difficult to address other cultural pirates or parts of the world adequately. So, what you start with is what you get unless you wanted to marry it to the table top version which could yield some interesting results.

3. There are a few other options such as Pirates and Plunder which in addition to be old and, therefore, hard to come by, is a classic RPG system which means that it is action based primarily and uses the clunky rules of an early genre. However, it is by far the most historically accurate game and it covers a lot of material from the coasts of Africa, to the Mediterranean, to the Caribbean and does so very well. It would be ideal for a small group setting that included experienced players. In those conditions, I think this is far and away the best game to use. Another game that could be considered is the Skull and Bones expansion for Dungeons and Dragons though this game is the least likely to function in the course as I am envisioning it. First, it is based on the popular D&D system but does not come with those rules, so you will need the basic rules of D&D to use this system. Second, because it is D&D derived it is fantastical in its creation; that is, there are elements to the game that are fantasy, like a race of dog people and crazy monsters. However, because it is D&D based it is more likely that students will be familiar with the system which would make it easier to use as a teaching tool, but it would require you to modify the system to eliminate the fantastical elements, unless you choose to include those. One aspect of this game that does recommend it, however, is the sheer amount of quality period information provided for the game.

There are obviously lots of options, these are just a few that I am familiar with, and this really does not include table top options which could provide a unique way to access the period and the experience of it. Whatever way you decide to go be sure to play the game ahead of time so that you can learn to use it and “get a feel” for it as a text. This is most easily accomplished by getting a few friends together for an afternoon of play and pizza. If you have no friends that can be relied on for such a thing, ask your students because they usually do or have played RPG’s and will show up for pizza. Plus, the student perspective is critical to evaluating the game play as a text for your course design.

Schedule of Assignments and Game Play Objectives:

*Caveat* This class works best as a single session seminar because the game play requires more time than a typical MWF or TR schedule could allow for, so I would recommend an afternoon or evening later in the week (Thursday evening or Friday afternoon) as the students will be more likely to play and engage heading into the weekend than at the start of the week. However, if

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you must play early in the week (Monday or Tuesday) make sure that your students are aware that the ‘end of class’ may vary slightly as each game session may require a little extra time to wrap up. This is essential to the success of the class because you don’t want to arbitrarily put a stop to the game play just to meet an official, externally imposed, timeline. A seminar class is usually scheduled for 2 ½ hours and these game episodes as I have outlined them can reasonably be achieved in under 3 hours; but not necessarily in 2 ½ and maybe not always in three. Tightly run games are necessary, however, to ensure everyone achieves the lesson goals.

*Caveat* Running an RPG can be a lot of work even if you don’t have a lot of people playing. The average game—the ideal number of players, is five—runs more smoothly if everyone feels like they are getting to play. The best way to handle this is to break the class into small groups of 4-6 (max) and treat them as “crews” that way you only have to run the game for the GM of the crews who would be the captain—this is a feature that could change week to week as you will see, but it is much easier to explain to a handful of students what you want to achieve and enlist them in the enterprise. This will also bring an element of surprise to the game for both you and the students. I usually circulate an email with the captains about the goals for the coming week’s game and then let them figure out the details. One way to be egalitarian about this is to require everyone to be the captain *at least once* and treat it as a grade for the class (how well did you plan the scenario, how well did you handle your crew, did you achieve the goals of the class, did you and everyone else have fun…you get the idea, I hope).

*Design* Because the first four class sessions are seminar lectures I have envisioned them as two classes. A lecture, a break, and a lecture; the lectures are nevertheless designed to be treated as a complementary unit. The readings for the remaining classes should be used to focus and contextualize the lesson built into the game play. However, rather than assign readings to each day in this outline of the course, I have left them blank so that they are open to interpretation—how many, by whom, and from what sources. My recommendations are listed in the bibliography, but feel free to utilize sources you are more familiar with or one that suit your needs. Many of the sources I have listed offer similar accounts and draw upon much of the same source material so there is a lot of flexibility.

*A note on the passing of time during game play* Pirates could spend an awful lot of time at sea with nothing of interest happening besides the steady work of swabbing the decks. To avoid that kind of boredom in your game play just make the days pass arbitrarily. So, if a crew takes a prize and says they are going to sail to a port to sell their booty just roll an appropriate dice (say, an eight-sided dice) and the number you roll is the number of days it took them to get there; or, contrarily, just pick a reasonable number and let the game play continue. This will be helpful in helping to determine how many journal entries (explained below, see week 5) they need to produce, or at least ensure that they make mention of the passing of the days. However, these “empty” days provide a lot of opportunity for the students to engage creatively. Maybe there as a fist fight, or they saw a whale, or whatever. The passing of the days gives them an opportunity to fill in the gaps between assigned entries.

Week One—Getting Our Bearings1. Readings: None2. Distribute Syllabus and discuss

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3. Lecture One: What is a pirate? (an outline for this lecture is provided below)4. Assignments: None

Week Two—Getting to Know the Golden Age 1. Readings:2. Important Religions and their relationships

This lecture should cover: Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, and Voodoo3. Pirate Communities and Friendly Ports

This lecture should cover: The Caribbean: Nassau, Tortuga, St. Kitts, Port Royal The Mediterranean: Malta, Spain, & the Barbary Coast Other Areas of interest: Atlantic coast of Africa,

Madagascar, South China Sea 4. Assignments: None

Week Three—Navigating the Golden Age1. Readings:2. Languages and Communication

This lecture should cover creole and lingua franca, but also the amount of time ittook for communication to take place. This is important both for understandingransoming, but also official decrees regarding ‘policing’ the Caribbean and Mediterranean.

3. Pirate Life and Life Aboard a ShipThis lecture should address the important aspects of pirate governance includingelection of the captain and officers, drawing up articles, life aboard a pirate shipcompared to a merchant or naval vessel. This is a good place to address genderspecifically.

4. Assignments: None

Week Four—So, What Was It Really Like? 1. Readings:2. Narrative accounts of pirates, captives, and survivors of pirate raids

This lecture should cover historical accounts written by people that lived amongpirates of their own volition or as captives as well as accounts of those whosurvived raids and attacks. This is also a good place to discuss gender.

3. Use the last half of this class to tie up loose ends and give an overview of the game andthe remainder of the semester.

4. Assignments: None

Week Five—Let’s Role Play! 1. Reading: The basic rules of the game including the responsibilities of the game master2. Explain the rules of the game and reinforce expectations for game play—be fair, be

consistent, be inclusive, don’t be rude, etc.3. The bulk of the class time should be used to generate characters for the game. You

Want to do this in class to ensure that no one cheats in the creation of theircharacter, but you also want to be able to address any questions or concerns thatcome up, and, with inexperienced players this could take awhile (90+ minutes).

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4. Assignments: Write the backstory for the character they created. This should develop both the reasons for turning pirate and their literal personal background:

where are they from, do they have a family, are they wealthy or poor, etc. Some of this information will be provided through the RPG system as part of the character generation, but students should still fill in the basic outline the RPG provides. The richer the story they provide their character the better they will be able to “inhabit” the role during game play.

Before the students are dismissed have them draw a secret identity from a hat. It is okay if the identities repeat, what is important is that the students keep it

a secret. This forms the basis of the major assignment for the course and the one that will ultimately be graded as the final. Each student should work their identity into their characters backstory, but only insofar as it allows you to see how they intend to play that aspect of their character. Here you can be as creative as you want to be; for instance, you could assign someone to be a spy for the English crown, or an investigative journalist, or a forlorn lover, a bounty hunter, or a scout for pirate hunters, or whatever. The key to this assignment is that each student will need to keep a running chronicle (journal) of their experiences as a member of the pirate crew. Not only will certain entries be assigned but each student should fill out their journal with creative writing, imaginative stories, etc. that draw upon their secret identity (e.g. As a spy for the Spanish crown they may note where the pirates like to careen their ships, or where a newly formed pirate haven exists…) Obviously, pirates spend a lot of time at sea and that time will pass quickly “in the game” but the students should account for it in their journal. As an example, if during game play you announce at the end of class that eighteen days have passed in total, you should reasonably expect three or five journal entries even though you may only assign one specific thing they have to write about.

Week Six—Getting into the Pirate’s Life 1. Reading: 2. Game Play: The goal of the first session of game play is to have the students acquire a

boat, choose a captain and officers, and set out to sea. How they acquire a boat can vary according to your imagination—mutiny, theft under cover of darkness, whatever exciting episodic feature you like, but you will need one for each “crew”. Additionally, there is no reason that they should start the game with a quality ship. It can be used as a feature of the next class session so they will want to upgrade their ship. The most critical part of this game session is to ensure that the players get to the point where they draw up their pirate articles. Part of drawing up the pirate articles is choosing a captain. Each crew’s chosen “captain” will run the crews’ games for all general game play (barroom brawls, meetings with strangers in port, buying and selling goods, etc.). This means that you only have to run the game for the captains and at the end of each game session you can either require that the players choose a new captain or give them the opportunity to do so. Prior to class each week circulate a list of objectives or story elements you want to captains to work

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into the game, or have a short meeting with them to make sure everyone is on the same page.

3. Assignment: A) journal entries B) collect the pirate articles (this is an easy grade for group work) C) a short (350-500 words) reflection on their pirate articles. What makes

them good, what don’t they like, what do think is missing, etc.

Week Seven—In Search of Prizes 1. Reading:2. Game play: The goal of this session of gameplay should focus on the ‘play’ aspect of

the game. This will allow the students to get to know the mechanics of the game, get to know each other, and, in the course of the session, upgrade their ship. You will want to structure the session around capturing two or three vessels. There are a couple of reasons for this: 1) they need to upgrade their ship. 2) They need to acquire booty. 3) They need to face the first round of hard decisions. First, let me say something about requirements one and two. During the rest of the game it will be imperative that they have a decent ship. However, they should not just luck into capturing a Ship of the Line and become the most dominant force in the Seven Seas. The best way to handle this is to prepare ahead of time a bunch of ships including detailed descriptions of the crew and cargoes as well as number of cannon, size and type, etc. It is important to keep the cargoes varied because a ship with only tobacco will make moving their goods too easy, and that is a key element to next week’s game. Make a few more than you think you’ll need assuming each “crew” will (attempt to) capture three. When they encounter a ship on the horizon have them draw a ship from a hat and then have them play the encounter. Some ships should be empty, others laden with goods but no money, some with little by way of goods, but wealthy. Include a few slave ships. Include a few military vessels. Make sure that the ships and the ships crews represent a diverse range of nationalities. This will make the third goal more relevant. Motivating them with number one, and having them pursue prizes, will force them into answering tough questions: what will we do with the crew, do we want to deal with the cargo, how should we handle the slaves, where should we sail to unload

the goods, etc.3. Assignment: Journaling. They should have plenty to talk about and reflect on.

Week Eight—Moving the Goods 1. Reading:2. Game Play: Depending on the cargoes captured have the students sell the contraband.

Divvying up booty is a core component of pirate articles and as such this will be necessary, after all it is what pirates are about—getting rich quick. The trick here is to craft the captured cargoes in such a way that the pirates cannot unload all in one port. You will want to require that they visit at least two ports—one a pirate haven and one a pirate friendly port—in order to move all their goods. This is also an opportunity in the game to mix up the crews, if you so choose, by forcing them into the same pirate friendly port

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where they can come together and share stories of their escapades, and mingle and see what they want to do. There are a couple of ways to allow them to switch crews. It will either happen organically but more likely you will have to manage it by dice rolls or other means to ensure that a bunch of people do not try to get in one group together. There is a good reason for doing this, several actually, one is that they will get the chance to revise/revisit their articles and draw up new ones—new crew, new articles—but it will also add a layer of intrigue and freshness to the secret journaling each student is doing. The important aspect of the journal here is that they reflect on the differences and similarities of the social and political aspects of the cities they visit and the crews they ultimately end up joining. The key feature of this game session is to ensure that during their cavorting in bars and brothels and hobnobbing with government officials on the take at least one person in each newly formed crew has come across a juicy morsel of information regarding possible treasure. The clue should be something cryptic like, “One Legged John is said to have made off with Governor X’s retirement fortune, but he was last seen near Port X and was never heard from again…” or “Rumor has it that the Spanish King has sent his personal envoy X to retrieve a collection of Incan treasure, but only Barnabus the Black knows where, he heard it strait from the lips of a Spanish sailor he skinned alive for the information…” The important feature of this teaser should be that no two crews are searching for the same treasure. This is not the

Amazing Race, you want them to have the same experience, but not to be competing for it, or else the first crew to get the information will be

targeted by the other crews and the game will rapidly devolve or, worse, turn into one giant joint effort that will push certain students to the margins of the game

play. There is plenty of booty in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean to ensure that everyone can become rich without having to kill each other to do it. The more creative you are with determining how, where, and why the treasure exists the more fun your students will have pursuing it.

3. Assignment: Their journal entries should include travelogue style accounts of each port they visited. Minimally that should amount to two of them—the haven and the

friendly port—but you may want to require that they research this a bit in order to make it historically accurate though each student should add their own personal point of view on the cities they visit.

Week Nine—Finding Clues, Part I 1. Reading:2. Game Play: Because the previous session should have ended with new crews informed

of potential treasure the pirates should be off in search of it. No treasure worth having is easy to find, but I would caution you here that pirates rarely, if ever, buried their loot (with the possible exception of Captain Kidd). Burying treasure is as iffy an actual thing as ‘walking the plank’ though there is at least one known example of walking the plank, the commonly associated practice is largely a dramatic event made popular by Hollywood. This game session should be their first attempt at finding additional information. Have it be the case that the whereabouts or some integral piece of

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information is known by a religious person—a catholic missionary that sailed with the envoy for a time, or a voodoo priestess that helped ol’ One Leg disappear, a slaver, who defrauded a governor, seeking asylum in a protestant church, etc. Choose any of the settlements around the Caribbean to house the religious person and send the pirates to acquire that information. How they go about getting that information is largely up to you and, ultimately, them, but this exercise gives them an opportunity to encounter religion in the region which is another excellent opportunity for assigning research and a

specific journal entry. It is always possible to have the person they are seeking be a recent convert to another religion so that the students have to deal with more

than one religion. The key element of this session is to ensure they get the next piece of information about the treasure. In some way, for some reason, the information gained here should point them toward a nearby (not walkable distance) Native village or settlement.

Assignment: Journal about religion.

Week Ten—Careening and the Mundane (plus, an attack!) Reading:Game Play: The information acquired from the religious person in the previous game

session should send your students into the wilder areas of the Caribbean. However, along the way two things should happen: one, there

should be a realization that the barnacles need to be cleaned off the ship forcing the crew to careen the ship. This is easy to work into the game by having the ships pilot point out that they are not making good time, that there are noticeable collections of barnacles near the water line, have them spring a leak so that it is a two for one, patching and cleaning, have them take damage during a storm to the sails or ship, whatever works for you. This should allow them to record in their journals the more mundane and labor-intensive work associated with being a pirate. Have them pay special attention to how the labor is divided, hunting, gathering wood, providing security, have them gamble or have a disagreement break out among the crew. It is also a good place to think about introducing illnesses to the pirate’s life (e.g. malaria, scurvy, a pox perhaps) which would be another good

research opportunity for them to journal about. This is a good opportunity to work into the story line the need to punish a rule breaker. The easiest way is to

have a member of the crew take more than their fair share of the rations. The Quartermaster aboard a pirate ship kept very good records of the rations and their distribution because pirates often had very large crews and very little by way of rations to make room for the crew and potential booty. The assumption being that captured ships would have additional supplies. Taking more than one’s share was a clear violation of the articles and required punishment. How, when, and to what extent is a matter of pirate crew decision making. Two, have the crew attacked by natives. Even if they are careened on an island there is ample historical evidence to suggest that natives were more than happy to canoe to where pirates were and kill them.

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The thing you need to stress here is that the local natives are clearly hostile. These two events should provide ample material for journaling.

Assignment: Journal entries.

Week Eleven—Finding Clues, Part II Reading:Game Play: Because the crews learned from the religious person earlier that there was an

important piece of information in a Native village, and because they now know that the locals are hostile, have them raid a village. They need to be looking for a specific thing that may not be readily apparent to them or can be easily hidden; a former slave with information, a military deserter, a local Native that acts as a scout, a map, etc. This will force the students to plan and execute the raid, but because they cannot sneak in under cover of darkness and find what they are after they will have to raid the village, and this will put them in a position of trying to determine what they will do, to what extent they will go to get what they are after, and the raid will provide an opportunity for an excellent journal article. Don’t make it too easy to find and raid the village. Make them earn it by marching through a jungle somewhere. The essential element of this session is making sure the students acquire the requisite information to move into the next class period. The information they gain should point them in the direction of a dignitary from one of the European empires, though it could also point them in the direction of a Mediterranean person, say, a Knight of Malta in the region to check on their holdings (the Knights temporarily purchased St. Kitts and other holdings in the Lower Antilles to try to raise money through sugar cane plantations, though this ultimately did not work out for them, it would be easy to use this as a narrative arc for variety.)

Assignment: Journal entries.

Week Twelve—Finding Clues, Part III Reading:Game Play: The information about the dignitary should point your students in the

direction of a stronghold or naval vessel. This will require them to attack something that is better defended than a Native village. However,

the key element to this session is not the taking of the fort or capturing a naval vessel, but rather finding the last bit of information about the treasure. The treasure should be loaded on a Spanish galleon recently departed for Spain. It is important that the students either capture a naval vessel or a stronghold because they will again need to upgrade their ship significantly if they are going to try to take a Spanish galleon carrying an important treasure. The other crucial element is that in capturing the fort or naval vessel the students inadvertently liberate a well- known pirate from the stockade. You will need to put a few pirate names in a hat to ensure that you don’t have five crews all working with Blackbeard. In fact, you may want to choose some lesser known pirates just to add an element of the unfamiliar to the students. This is important because the pirate is going to inform them that their crew is too small to attack the

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Spanish ship, but the liberated pirate will help them raise a bigger crew and attack the Spanish. Have the students sail into a harbor they have not visited to raise the necessary crew. While there have them witness a pirate execution. The execution will provide the storyline necessary to motivate the pirates around town to sign up for the dangerous task of attacking a Spanish galleon—that and a cut of a massive treasure. There is a research opportunity here as well in the form of having them add a new travelogue entry to their journals, as well as their reaction to the execution, and, finally, perhaps most importantly, have them do research into the famous pirate they are working with and add an entry that records their impression and reaction to him (or her if you wanted to include Anne Bonny or Mary Read).

Assignment: Research and Journal entries.

Week Thirteen—Treasure!Reading:Game Play: This is the culmination of the semester so let them go wild. It will be to their

advantage to see a lot of the pirates they recruited die (everyone wants a bigger piece of the pie) but this battle should form the near entirety of the game—

capturing a Spanish galleon is no easy task after all. Divide up the treasure and let the liberated pirate and the recruited pirates take the galleon. Have your students sail into the sunset wealthy.

Assignment: Tell each student that after having come into such a windfall they have decided to establish a society for pirates and other outcasts somewhere in

the world—literally anywhere. Have them design and explain the utopia: where did they decide to put it, how did they organize it, what are the rules governing it, have them pay special attention to how their experiences as pirates influenced their decisions.

Week Fourteen—The Utopia DiscussionReading: NoneIn Class Presentation: Have each student give a short description of their utopia to the

class. Let this take up the first half of the class time. Have a discussion about what should or shouldn’t be in a utopia, have them discuss what they liked or didn’t like in other students’ communities. Finally, have them choose someone else’s utopia to live in—see if there is consensus.

Assignment: final journal entries—these should chronicle the utopia the students founded. It should also in some way indicate what happened to it, that is,

what brought about its demise. Was it an internal failing? Was it external pressures? Disease? They shouldn’t say with exact specificity how it came to an end, but rather leave clues to how it ended.

Week Fifteen—Reflections and Final thoughtsReading: NoneIn Class Discussion: What did we learn, what do we think, what would we do differently,

etc. and this should also allow for course evaluations if they need to be administered in class.

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Assignments: Turn in journals.

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Introductory lecture

I. Opening remarks (take roll, etc.)A. Outline goals for the lecture:

1. explain and identify the different groups of pirates and correlate them to their hunting grounds

2. explain the difference between pirates and privateers3. explain the gray areas that exist in our identification of pirates (i.e. historical

backgrounds, socio-political entanglements, cultural contexts, etc.)4. answer the question: What is a pirate?

B. Why this topic? Why this Class? (this is a chunk of the lecture that needs to be tailored to the intentions and course goals specific to the instructor).

II. What is a pirate?A. It is important to tease out the difference between pirate (lowercase p) and Pirate

(capital P) in order to make comparisons and conversations easier in futurelectures.1. A pirate is anyone who operates on the fringes of, or outside, the law whose

primary means of operation is water-based (ocean, sea, rivers, etc.) though this does not mean that they have to do so exclusively.

When using the term ‘pirate’ we are capturing that class of individuals whose primary goal is to fleece their livelihood from legitimate maritime

business. That is, ‘pirate’ is a catchall term for maritime predation used widely throughout history and across cultures and is a term that is often used interchangeably with brigand, robber, criminal, outlaw, bandit, corsair and others. 2. A Pirate is, generally, a maritime predator whose primary area of activity is the

Atlantic triangle formed by the western coast of Africa, the Caribbean islands, and New England. This class of maritime predators came into existence alongside European expansion into the New World and their heyday was roughly 1650-1720 depending on who you are reading you will find this period of time lengthened or shortened by five or ten years on either end or both, which is going to be the focal point of the course. The Pirates, operating primarily in this area and in this time period, are known as Golden Age Pirates.

B. Pop Culture vs. the Real thing1. What a Pirate isn’t—it is important to stress here that the popular conception of

pirates, produced by popular culture, which in many ways builds upon folk narratives, often obfuscates the realities of pirate life. For

instance, pirates lived aboard overcrowded ships, had a prey for pay policy that meant a seafaring venture could result in lots of time and no money, were subject to intense periods of boredom, and worked in often grueling conditions to keep the ships and arms in good order. At sea pirates followed strict rules that governed their behavior and, adding to the stresses, they sailed under the constant shadow of the hangman’s noose. Pirates have been romanticized for centuries on the

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heels of the Golden Age and one of the key objectives of the course is not only to dispel that pop culture mythos, but to identify why it exists.

i. A couple of examples that might help are Errol Flynn, Johnny Depp’s Captain Jack Sparrow, Disney’s first full length feature

film was Treasure Island and Mickey Mouse and company have had numerous pirate adventures throughout their careers, feel free to add others.

ii. Be sure to compare the list in ‘i.A’ to a few real life anecdotes like L’Olonnais eating a captives beating heart to terrify another captive into spilling the beans about how to avoid the local

garrison. Captain Kidd being placed in irons and hung from a gibbet, or how Mediterranean corsairs would often joyously hack a captive to pieces to cow other captives into submission, really the little horrifying stories abound and are easy to find. Pick your favorites.

III. Why are pirates so hard to identify?A. Pirates are difficult to identify because of the interchangeable use of the term to

identify persons living outside the law. Often, records of maritime raids and violence will attribute those actions to ‘pirates’ when the guilty

party is, in actuality, a very specific type of pirate. That is, they are a group of individuals that are acting piratically but are themselves not necessarily Pirates. As we will see below, this is a common mistake made when trying to discuss corsair activity during the Golden Age.

B. Besides corsairs, Vikings are a good example of a group of individuals, living in a cultural context that provides a specific identity, that are mistaken for

pirates or who are, at times, described as pirates though they very clearly were not. Vikings are not pirates in spite of their seafaring prowess because Vikings, most importantly, were not primarily searching for seaborne prizes. Rather, Vikings probed coastlines and riverways looking for villages to pillage and plunder. Occasionally, especially after they discovered England to the West, Vikings would establish raiding staging grounds and live in an area for incredible lengths of time to adequately pillage and plunder an area. Vikings, rather than being pirates, are raiders, marauders even, but they are not pirates even though one could say they acted as pirates. There are some similarities nonetheless between pirates and Vikings. For instance, pirates sometimes cultivated fields and grew crops to sustain themselves both in times of need, shipwreck say, and to support their pirate communities. However, Pirates were primarily water based for most of their operations.

C. Most groups, especially during the Early Modern Era, that utilized the sea as the foremost conduit for carrying out their activities and for whom those

activities were violations of legal, legitimate trade or sovereignty, were called pirates. The result of this is that numerous actions fall under the guise of piracy. Piracy, as such, has existed for as long as there have been humans brave enough to sail, but the piracy of the Golden Age is different, categorically, because pirates lived in communities, self-identified, and, in

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doing so, created their own identities, they created their own rules of governance and, though they operated for the most part without legal sanction, they worked in tandem with governments to advance their own aims and objectives. The important thing to remember is that even though

the terms during this time and, subsequently afterward, applied by historians, can be applied synonymously to various persons, the identities of these groups are

distinct—even when the individuals they are being applied to are too complex to fit entirely, or neatly, into one category.

IV. Pirates and PrivateersA. The first and most important thing for this section of the lesson is to reinforce the

distinction and, ultimately, the lack thereof, between privateers and pirates. It is important both for a proper historical understanding of maritime predation— especially as a source of qualified pirate labor—but also for the game itself where you could, if you wanted to, work in the acquisition of a letter of marque from a governor. This would give you another research opportunity for the students and a reflective journal entry and, perhaps, more than one if they decide to violate its terms and/or use it to escape punitive actions at sea. It may also prove useful as a research opportunity even if you do not work it into the game itself because that will help students get familiar with the time period, the language of predation, and the ambiguous relationship governments had to piracy when it was to their benefit.

1. What is a privateer? A privateer is someone with legal sanction to disrupt and plunder enemy shipping. The key here is “enemy” since privateers

were usually, almost exclusively, hired to ply their trade during times of war. An individual would be granted a Letter of Marque by a governor or some other ranking member of the government, then they would, at their own expense, hire a crew and outfit their ship, then they could legally attack and loot any ship belonging to enemy navies, merchants, or their allies. Essentially, a privateer is a private contractor acting as a paramilitary force and they were entitled to keep a percentage of their takings the rest being surrendered to the Crown. Some privateers, and quite a few Pirates, carried several Letters of Marque, some real, others forged, and operated as they saw fit attacking anything and everything they could. When peace was reached between warring governments the Letters of Marque became null and void. However, that did little to deter the enterprising privateer who would often just revert back to piracy or seek employ in the service of another warring faction.

Notable example: Sir Francis Drake

V. Where were pirates hunting in the Golden Age?A. A visual aid is a must here, some sort of map, that you can use to show where in the

world pirates were operating. It is crucial to point out that these areas overlap and should not be thought of exclusively with one group. This, too, is a critically important reason for the difficulty in determining who is and who

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isn’t a pirate. However, the groups have become tethered over time to these geopolitical regions:

1. FreebootersArea of Operation: Primarily the Lower Antilles and the coastal areas of

Brazil and the northern edge of South America and to a lesser extent the lower coast of Central America, specifically the Spanish holdings up the Mosquito Coast and into the Gulf region.

Who they were: Opportunists usually of English, French or Dutch origin living the Caribbean and known for harassing Spanish

shipping in 16th and 17th centuries. The term ‘freebooter’ is of Dutch origin, “vrijbuiter,” but has a more common Spanish counterpart in “Filibustero” which English translates into “Freebooter”. A freebooter is any person engaged in unauthorized military actions, what today we would call a guerrilla, and these individuals would form the backbone of what was to become the “Brethren of the Coast”. Their activities are decidedly piratical and unsanctioned.

Notable examples: Jean Fluery and François Le Clerc

2. BuccaneersArea of Operation: Spanish island holdings in the Caribbean, primarily

Tortuga, but had a working relationship with the English and French governments in the northern Caribbean, specifically St. Kitts and Port Royal also, to a lesser extent, after their conflicts with the Spanish drove them to sea, the Southern tip of Florida and the Bahamas.

Who they were: Primarily poor French colonial subjects inhabiting theisland of Hispaniola (modern day Haiti) who made their

living hunting wild game and preparing the meat in an traditional native way (a method learned from the Arawak Natives) which used a ‘boucan’ to prepare the meat. When the Spanish tried to rid the island of the “buccaneers” the English and French governments saw an opportunity and licensed, through Letters of

Marque, or supported through other means of backing, Buccaneer resistance. Ultimately, this led not only to an increase in piracy as the largely land-based Buccaneers allied with pirates to move goods, dodge Spanish military efforts, and increase their hunting area—Spanish hunting area. The Buccaneer tradition will become the heartbeat of the Brethren of the Coast.

Notable example: François l’Olonnais

3. Pirates

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Area of Operation: The Atlantic Triangle with the major areas of their operations located in the Caribbean and

along the coast of the American Colonies, especially the stretch of coast from St. Augustine, Fl to the outer banks of North Carolina and, to a lesser extent, as far East as Madagascar including shipping in and around the English Channel and the slave coast of Africa.

Who they were: Pirates were known as “villains of all nations” because they were indiscriminate in who they attacked. They cared

neither for treaties nor nationalities in choosing their victims, though nation of origin could become a factor in determining how captives, especially captains and officers, were treated or disposed of. Pirates also made their homes in the Atlantic triangle often establishing communities specifically geared to their notions of society which, again, were decidedly different than their European prey. Nassau was a pirate haven that serviced many pirate ships and offered not only shelter but community for pirates. Pirates made and broke alliances with regional governors often securing Letters of Marque for reasons of self-preservation. They were often violent toward their victims, but rarely so toward one

another, Blackbeard being an obvious example. They often freed slaves and encouraged them to join their crews. Of the roughly

5,000 or so pirates sailing in the Atlantic triangle during the Golden Age historians estimate that about 25 to 30% were freed

African slaves. Like the Mediterranean where communication was critical to the success of a maritime voyage, and the crews were often internationally composed, a language developed to meet this need. We know this language today as Creole which, unlike its Mediterranean counterpart Lingua Franca, solidified in the Caribbean culture, especially along the northern edge of the Gulf of Mexico. Golden Age pirates are the culmination of a century of pirate activity in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean and formed the central nervous system of a trans-oceanic community of outcasts that we know as the Brethren of the Coast.

Notable example: Edward “Blackbeard” Teach

4. CorsairsArea of Operation: (Muslims) The Mediterranean but also ranged as far

north as Iceland and Baltimore, Ireland (both successful raids) as well as a few attempts on England and raids along the Normandy coast

disrupting maritime activity from the Straits of Gibraltar to Flemish holdings in Northern

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Europe and from the Straits east along the North African coast all the way to the shipping lanes and strongholds of the Ottoman Empire.

(Christian) The Mediterranean, primarily, but also included holdings in the Caribbean as well.

Christian corsairs sailed primarily out of strongholds in Malta, but were also operationally active along the Spanish, French, Italian, Adriatic, and Ottoman coasts. They primarily targeted Muslim and Turkish shipping from Constantinople (viz. Istanbul) throughout the Levant and along the Barbary coast.

Who they were: It is important to stress for students that corsairs, while they are often, and perhaps too easily identified by their

religious affiliations, were a mixed bag when it came to crew composition, complexity of geopolitical identity, and overall objectives. Corsairs often sailed with semi- or quasi-official sanction and both Christian and Muslim corsairs were in the business of capturing slaves, commandeering cargo, and generally disrupting the economic and political stability of their counterparts. Corsairs attacked targets on water and on land and functioned as a both paramilitary forces and extrajudicial agents. Though most people tend to associate the corsair with the Muslim imagery that is

largely, again, a product of Hollywood. Though there were substantially more Muslim bases or ports for corsairs to operate out

of their existence is as much a product of their location in a loosely held together Turkish empire than it is because corsairs were

primarily Muslim—this is especially important to mark out for students because a Muslim corsair did not need to originate in Arabic or Turkish lands as many corsairs, including some of the most successful and fearsome, were renegades. The existence of renegades is important because it cleanly picks out the stitching that binds the Caribbean and the Mediterranean together. These locales are products of the same geopolitical structures, the Pirates in the Atlantic Triangle were struggling against and within the same frameworks that gave shape and definition to the Golden Age corsair. Technology, tactics, and certainly information moved between the cultures of the Mediterranean influencing the various political juggernauts decision making process just as certainly did the influx of wealth from the newly discovered world have a significant impact on the Mediterranean. One key feature of this

relationship is the renegade who moved from a Christian usually European background into a Muslim identity bringing with them

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the knowledge of the sea and often knowledge of the Atlantic that improved corsair activity both in terms of success and range—it

was a renegade that led the raid on Iceland.Notable example: Barbarossa Brothers (Muslim)

John Ward (Renegade) Alonso de Contreras (Christian)

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