When you think pirates, you probably imagine treasure maps, rum-soaked songs, and maybe Johnny Depp staggering around...
Pirates
The Golden Age of Piracy, spanning roughly from the 1650s to the 1730s, was marked by a surge in maritime raiding across the Atlantic and the Caribbean. This period saw the rise of infamous figures such as Edward Teach, Henry Every and Bartholomew Roberts, operating at a time when empires were expanding and naval power was in flux. Pirates targeted merchant shipping routes, often exploiting colonial rivalries and weak enforcement. While romanticised in later fiction, piracy in this era was brutal, opportunistic and shaped by the politics and economics of empire, trade and war. It left a complex and lasting historical legacy.
When Black Sails first arrived on screen, it promised a pirate drama that could stand alongside the...
Pirates from the so-called Golden Age (roughly 1650 to 1730) have been endlessly romanticised in books, films...
The television series Black Sails reimagines many historical pirates, but few are depicted with the same sharp...
Sir Francis Drake was a privateer, explorer, naval commander and symbol of Elizabethan ambition. Celebrated in England...
Pirates left more than just tales of buried treasure and shipwrecks behind. Many of the words and...
Edward Low, also known as Ned Low, was one of the most notoriously violent pirates of the...
Cheung Po Tsai was one of the most infamous pirates of the early nineteenth century, operating in...
Jean Lafitte remains one of the most enigmatic figures of early 19th-century piracy. Smuggler, privateer, slave trader,...
Samuel Bellamy, often called “Black Sam,” was one of the most notorious pirates of the early 18th...