Jolly RogerCourier Corporation, 12/07/2012 - 294 páginas "Highly entertaining and well-documented." — TheNew York Times While history has painted most pirates as "abominable brutes," capable of the worst cruelties and driven by insatiable greed, the author of this fascinating study insists that pirates have suffered more than their share of bad press, mainly from popularizing writers trying to sell books. He notes, for example, that Henry Morgan always carried privateering commissions signed by the governor of Jamaica, and that many pirates bought commissions (and pardons) from governors of the American colonies. With this in mind, Mr. Pringle tries to separate fact from fiction in chronicling the activities of the infamous men and women who sailed under the black flag during the great age of piracy. Beginning with Sir Francis Drake, the "Father of Modern Piracy," he examines the lives and deeds of such outlaws as Morgan, Captain Kidd, Blackbeard, Anne Bonney, and Mary Read, as well as a raft of lesser-known scoundrels, finding, for the most part, that the myths about these maritime marauders are largely overblown. Pirates, for example, never made their prisoners walk the plank. This was a nineteenth-century fiction with no basis in reality. Moreover, the atrocities pirates are accused of, if true, were no worse, and sometimes not nearly as bad, as the horrific punishments (brandings, drawing and quartering, burning alive, etc.), meted out by legitimate governments of the age. In short, while piracy undoubtedly was a fact of life in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the reality was far less brutal and blood-soaked than the sensationalizing writers of the time and of a later day would have us believe. The true state of affairs is unfolded in this engrossing, impeccably accurate history, sure to delight any armchair sailor, maritime historian or old salt with its balanced, highly readable study of the seagoing brigands who sailed under the Jolly Roger. |
Índice
CHAPTER FOUR Jacobean and Carolines | |
CHAPTER FIVE Brethren of the Coast | |
CHAPTER SIX Morgan | |
CHAPTER SEVEN The Last of the Buccaneers | |
CHAPTER NINE On the Account | |
CHAPTER TEN Flags Red and Black | |
CHAPTER FIFTEEN Pirate Republic | |
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Woodes Rogers of Nassau | |
CHAPTER NINETEEN Another Madagascar | |
CHAPTER TWENTY The Great Pirate Roberts | |
CHAPTER TWENTYONE Captain Snelgraves Story | |
CHAPTER TWENTYTWO The Decline of Piracy | |
A CATALOG OF SELECTED DOVER BOOKS IN ALL FIELDS | |
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Palavras e frases frequentes
Age of Piracy American Anne Bonny atrocities attack Bahamas Bartholomew Roberts Bellomont Blackbeard Bonnet British buccaneer captain buccaneers Cape Captain Kidd careening coast Cocklyn command commission Council for Trade crew crime cruise Davis defend Drake East India Company Eastern Seas Edward England English evidence expedition Exquemelin fight flag fleet forced French Galley Government guns harbour Henry Howell Davis hundred island John Johnson Kidd’s killed King King’s Leeward Islands London loot Lord Madagascar Mainwaring Mary’s men-of-war Modyford Morgan naval Navy North Carolina º º º officers pardon pirate base pirate captain pirate round pirate ship plunder port prisoners privateering prizes punishment quartermaster Red Sea reported Royal Royal African Company sailed seamen seems sent share ship’s slaves sloop Snelgrave Spain Spanish Spotswood Stede Bonnet story taken Thomas told took torture treasure trial usually vessel Vice-Admiralty Court Virginia voyage West Indies William Woodes Rogers wrote