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A review by oleksandr
The Golden Age of Piracy: The Truth Behind Pirate Myths by Benerson Little
4.0
This book takes myths about pirates and piracy and debunks them one by one. It limits itself with piracy by Europeans in 1650-1725 primarily in the Caribbean. The book is quite interesting, rich in details, with large bibliography and massive footnotes. Sometimes it goes too greatly into the details like discussing which fencing techniques and more specifically feints and hits could have been used by dueling pirates and the like. It cites a lot of fiction and film and show where they err.
The [non-exhaustive] list of myths:
- Pirates usually used black flags with skull and bones
- They used galleons as their ships and hunted galleons
- They often fought and boarded ships
- Their primary weapon is a cutlass
- They primarily hunted in the open ocean
- They were rebels
- They fought slavers
- There was a pirate kingdom
- There were female pirate captains
- There were non-white pirate captains
- There were pirate treasures
Most of these things had a grain of truth but were exaggerated out of proportion.
An interesting read for all the lovers of pirate fiction.
The [non-exhaustive] list of myths:
- Pirates usually used black flags with skull and bones
- They used galleons as their ships and hunted galleons
- They often fought and boarded ships
- Their primary weapon is a cutlass
- They primarily hunted in the open ocean
- They were rebels
- They fought slavers
- There was a pirate kingdom
- There were female pirate captains
- There were non-white pirate captains
- There were pirate treasures
Most of these things had a grain of truth but were exaggerated out of proportion.
An interesting read for all the lovers of pirate fiction.