Yo-ho, yo-ho a pirate’s life for me! In this not-so-romantic blog, I’ve made a guide to pirates so you are prepared if you ever find yourself back in time during the golden age of piracy.
I think pretty much everyone has heard of pirates and almost everyone has probably pretended to be, and dressed, as one before. Walk the plank and all that. Actually, pirates never made people walk the plank – I’m as disappointed as you about that.
Pirates have existed since at least 1353 BCE, with reports of ships being robbed. These aren’t the pirates we normally think of though- the pirates we imagine are those from the late 1600s and early 1700s in an era known as the ‘Golden Age of piracy’.
In this period ships were attacked, robbed and sunk- mostly in the Caribbean, but spread from the north Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean.
This not-so-romantic blog is my guide to pirates. I promise I’ll try and resist making any pirate jokes… I think.
The pirate outfit
Let’s start this guide to pirates by talking about the pirate outfit.
Most pirates would have worn the same outfits as most sailors of the age. Their clothing was known as slops. Some of the lower-ranked pirate crew would actually not even wear any boots or socks- imagine getting a splinter in your big toe? Or any toe for that matter.
Breeches- These were short tight pants. Basically, skinny fit 3/4 trousers, rips at the bottom would make them look cooler I suppose, but rips could get annoying if it was windy.
Eyepatch- The eyepatch is one of the more notable parts of the pirate outfit, it’s certainly a staple point in any half-decent fancy dress costume. I used to think the eyepatch was to hide a hideous hole where an eye should be after it had been cut out in a ferrous battle. But, in fact, pirates wore an eyepatch so the eye was better suited to fight in the dark below deck when needed. Some eat carrots for better night vision, pirates wore an eyepatch.
Linen shirt- a lovely shirt. Typical fancy dress costumes suggest white linen shirts were the pirate favourite- but in reality, the shirts could be any colour. What colour would your shirt of choice be? As for me- I think I’d go with a pink shirt.
Scarfs and caps- Being on a ship in a warm climate but you at great risk of sunburn- and, since the first suncream wasn’t invented until 1938, pirates needed to protect themselves from the weather. To do this they’d wear caps, a little like bandanas to protect their heads and occasional thin scarfs to keep the direct sun off their necks. The bandana would be good for keeping sweat out of your eyes as well.
Pirate captains and their commanding officers would wear smarter attire with longer coats and probably an epically cool hat. There’s actually no physical evidence that pirate captains wore hats – the hats we see in films are called tricorne hats- but let’s not let a lack of evidence ruin our imagination.
Perhaps the most important thing to take away from this section… scratch that, from this entire blog is that the 19th of September is international ‘dress and talk like a pirate day’. I hope to see you all in your finest pirate attire.
Pirate weapons
Cutlass– Perhaps the most recognised of the pirate’s weapons is the cutlass. It’s a sword really. But the cutlass had a slightly curved blade.
Axe- An axe was an important weapon for a pirate. Not only was it good for chopping parts off your enemies, but it was good for chopping rope off ship sails. Not having sails would considerably slow a ship down.
Flintlock pistol- When it came to a gun, pirates seemed to favour the inaccurate one. The flintlock pistol made a lot of noise, made a lot of smoke- but didn’t often hit the intended target. They also took an awfully long time to load so you would probably only get to shoot it once before converting it into an improvised bat.
Ducks foot pistol- These were pistols with 4 barrels, all of which could shoot at the same time. Why were they called Duck’s foot pistols? The 4 barrels stuck together looked a little bit like a duck’s foot.
Tar bombs- PIrates used to get a big clump of tar and wrap it around a length of rope. They would then light the tar on fire and hurl the rope at enemy ships. The tar would stick to the wood of the ships and was almost impossible to get off. This would set the enemy ships on fire.
pirate food
An important part of any trip or place we visit is what food is going to be on offer. So what food was on the pirate ship menu?
Quite often pirates would share the deck with chickens who would provide the crew with eggs- until the chickens were eaten of course. On some occasions, the pirates would even bring a cow along for the journey for fresh milk… though they would eventually eat the cow as well.
The biggest problem when travelling on a ship for months without a fridge or a freezer is that your food tends to go rotten fairly quickly. So the first couple of weeks of travel would be a feast for the belly… it wouldn’t be quite as pleasant after that.
You’d be eating a lot of biscuits, dried beans and salted beef. Not the most inspiring menu. To attempt to make the food taste better cooks would add a lot of herbs and spices to try and get rid of any not-so-romantic tastes.
To quench your thirst there wouldn’t be much water- despite being in the middle of the ocean- so you’d be drinking beer mostly as there was less chance it would poison you- you can’t forget rum either.
Pirate myths which aren’t actually true
Over the years, a lot of stories have been written about pirates which had led to lots of things which probably aren’t true. So in this short section, I’m going to bust some pirate myths which aren’t true.
- Pirates made people walk the plank – I mentioned this earlier, but pirates didn’t make people walk the plank. If they wanted them dead, they’d just shoot them.
- Pirates used to bury treasure- This might have happened occasionally, but the pirate treasure was divided between the crew. Happy crew meant you weren’t thrown off your own ship.
- Pirates saying “argh”- I’m sad about this one. Pirates did talk but probably didn’t say argh. We have Hollywood to thank for this myth.
Pirates you should be afraid of
To finish off the blog here are a few of the pirates you should definitely do your best to avoid should you ever travel back to the golden age of piracy—an important thing to note though.
The reason we’ve heard of all these pirates is that they were the ones who got caught. I wonder how mean and nasty the pirates who didn’t get caught were…
Bartholomew Roberts
Bartholomew Roberts is not one of the hardest names to spell, he was also one of the most successful pirates- taking over 400 prizes in his piracy career. Prizes in a pirate sense were either captured ships, equipment or cargo- taken whilst plundering. So he didn’t capture 400 ships- it was 400 prizes altogether.
He created his own pirate code, got rich, and travelled the world before dying on the battlefield.
Blackbeard
I have absolutely no doubt you’ve heard of a famous pirate with a particularly big black beard. Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard, was one of the most fearsome pirates. Did you know that he actually used to braid candles into his beard to make himself look more fearsome? He created one heck of a fire risk when he lit the candles, though. I’m not sure if he ever accidentally set his beard on fire, but it wouldn’t have been pleasant if he ever had.
Edward fought in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) but turned to piracy when he attacked and captured a French slave ship “La Concorde”. He wasn’t a fan of the name so he changed it to “Queen Anne’s revenge”. He added 40 cannons to his new ship and began to become a menace in the West Indies.
Blackbeard is perhaps most notable for blockading- (which means blocking things going in and out) Charleston in South Carolina for over a week. His leadership skills could quite easily be questioned as he was known to kill his own crew for sport.
Blackbeard meant a gruesome end on the 22nd of November 1718 when he was beheaded on the battlefield.
prince of pirates
Perhaps a slightly less-known pirate was probably the richest. Samuel Bellamy is often known as the prince of pirates, though I prefer the nickname ‘Robin Hood of the seas’. He didn’t have the longest pirating career, with it only lasting about a year and a half, but it is thought he, and his crew, captured well over 50 ships in that time.
Capturing and plundering over 50 ships was certainly a good way to make yourself rich as a pirate. He apparently once made his crew charge naked onto target ships to scare the opposing crew.
He died when his ship was caught in a storm near Massachusetts and crashed into a rock build-up. Everyone onboard, including Bellamy, died. His ship was discovered in 1984 and was the first golden age piracy ship to be found in northern America. Treasure from the ship is still being excavated and bought to the surface today.
William Kidd
William Kidd was actually sent to the Caribbean to capture and defeat pirates, but Kidd had different ideas. He robbed a couple of ships and instead of sharing the loot with the rich Americans who had given him a ship to capture pirates with, he shared the pirate booty with his crew.
Kidd returned to London and was arrested and hung. Actually, he was hung twice as on the first attempt the rope snapped.
Pirate jokes
Here are some of my favourite pirate jokes- try them on your friends and watch them wet themselves with laughter.
- Why did Captain Hook cross the road? To get to the second-hand shop
- What’s a pirate’s favourite shop? Arrrgos
- What do pirates wear on Halloween? A pumpkin patch
Be sure to let me know your favourite pirate joke in the comments! (Please)
And there’s my not-so-romantic ‘guide to pirates’- best of luck on your adventures!
what to read next
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