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Pirate Facts Main
General History
Types of Piracy
Famous Pirates
Pirate Facts
Pirate Ships
Pirate Vocabulary
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Welcome to Pirates! Fact- General History. The information is
divided into six separate sections for quicker loading times.
[Introduction] [Ancient
Piracy] [Roman Times]
[Middle Ages] [Golden
Years of Piracy]
[Contemporary Pirates]
Introduction:
The history of piracy dates back more than 3000 years, but its accurate
account depends on the actual meaning of the word �pirate�. In English, the word
piracy has many different meanings and its usage is still relatively new. Today,
some uses of the word have no particular meaning at all. A meaning was first
ascribed to the word piracy sometime before the XVII century. It appears that
the word pirate (peirato) was first used in about 140 BC by the Roman historian
Polybius. The Greek historian Plutarch, writing in about 100 A.D., gave the oldest
clear definition of piracy. He described pirates as those who attack without legal
authority not only ships, but also maritime cities. Piracy was described for the
first time, among others, in Homer's The Iliad and The Odyssey.
For a great many years there remained no unambiguous definition of piracy. Norse
riders of the 9th and 11th century AD were not considered
pirates but rather, were called "Danes" or "Vikings". Another
popular meaning of the word in medieval England was "sea thieves". The
meaning of the word pirate most closely tied to the contemporary was established in
the XVIII century AD. This definition dubbed pirates "outlaws" whom even
persons who were not soldiers could kill. The first application of international law
actually involved anti-pirate legislation. This is due to the fact that most pirate
acts were committed outside the borders of any country.
Sometimes governments gave rights to the pirates to represent them in their
wars. The most popular form was to give a license to a private sailor to attack
enemy shipping on behalf of a specific king � Privateer. Very often a privateer
when caught by the enemy was tried as an outlaw notwithstanding the license. Below
we tried to outline a selective history of piracy, selective and arbitrary because
there is so much that can be said about piracy and it is impossible to tell all. We
hope that even this brief introduction will show the spirit and truth about the
piracy the way we see it.
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