Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 21:27:41 -0400
Subject: [SCA-AS] Links: Pirates
Greetings! <<warning: a joke cometh>>Do you know where Pirate
Captains stow their Buccaneers? Under their Buckin' hats!
It being the month of outrageous costumes, I have chosen Pirates as this week's
Links topic. I must confess that I have a photo of Captain Jack Sparrow on
my desk top. The sparrow being the heraldic Cockney beastie (I am a creature
of distinctly Cockney origins), I thought his portrayal quite apt. Not all
Pirates are Historical to our era of study---but a lot of them ARE!
Below you will find a list of 20 or so links, some of them in fun, that relate
to Piracy in some way, and also somewhat through our time period. Be sure
to check out your Pirate Name at the website, discover a bit about Pirate
Navigation, Pirate Law, Pirate Wrecks, and more.
Be sure to pass this along to those who will find it interesting, and be sure
to pirate it away from those who will be offended.
Cheers
Iron Bess Vane (or Aoife, as I am more commonly known)
Dame Aoife Finn of Ynos Mon
Aethelmearc
What's My Pirate Name?
http://www.fidius.org/quiz/pirate.php
A fun quiz to determine your true "Pirate Name." Mine is Iron Bess Vane. Make
of it what you will :)
Medieval Pirates
http://www2.kumc.edu/itc/staff/rknight/Pirate.htm
(Site Excerpt) An ongoing site with articles and links on pirates as they
apply to the Middle Ages and the SCA. Medieval Pirate Information. Associated
Nautical Information. Pirate Websites (many have post-1600 info).Flag Information.
The History of Pirates by Angus Konstam (A book review)
http://www.ferncanyonpress.com/pirates/library/history.shtml
(Site Excerpt) This book chronicles the violence, bravery, danger, and cruelty
of those who have taken to the sea in search of wealth. It covers thousands
of years--from ancient Greece and Rome to the Spanish Main to modern pirates.
It has a pirate timeline, plus individual maps showing where each of the featured
pirates operated. And it's written by pirate authority Angus Konstam, former
curator of Arms and Armour at the Tower of London and now the chief curator
of the Mel Fisher Maritime Museum in Key West.
Pirates! Fact and Legend
http://www.piratesinfo.com/
Biographies of Famous Pirates (booklist)
http://www.piratesinfo.com/biography/biography.php
Mr Donn's World History of Pirates (about 1/3 down the page--lots of other
good medieval and renaissance life lessons here, as well)
http://www.members.aol.com/MrDonnHistory/World.html#PIRATES
(Site Excerpt) Includes: Step Lively Matey - There be Pirates afoot!
Pirates Lesson Plans
The Dark Frigate (lesson plan, pirates, Newberry Award winner)
Pirates Homepage from Rochedale School
Pirates: Student Projects and Reports from Capt John Smith Elem
Pirates (clickable worksheet)
Corny Pirate Riddles (shockwave from Clevermedia)
Pirates (national geographic interactive)
Pirates Theme Page (CLN)
YoHo! It be them medieval Pirates! (semi-tongue in cheek)
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Village/4030/pg31.html
(Site Excerpt) Some instances of Medieval Piracy or conflict over sea-trade:
In 1217, after young Henry III became king, his main men William Marshall
and Hubert DeBurgh defended his kingdom. While Marshall, Ranulf de Blundeville
and French mercenary Falkes de Breauté fought the invading French knights
and soldiers on land, De Burgh and King John's illegitimate son Richard Fitz-John
routed the French reinforcements at sea at Sandwich, defeating naval captain
Eustace the Monk, a French mercenary and probable pirate, who was executed
and his head exhibited on a spear.
Medieval Sourcebook
Three Sources on the Ravages of the Northmen in Frankland, c. 843 - 912
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/843bertin.html
(Site Excerpt) 843 A.D. Pirates of the Northmen's race came to Nantes, killed
the bishop and many of the clergy and laymen, both men and women, and pillaged
the city. Thence they set out to plunder the lands of lower Aquitaine. At
length they arrived at a certain island [the isle of Rhé, near La Rochelle,
north of the mouth of the Garonne], and carried materials thither from the
mainland to build themselves houses; and they settled there for the winter,
as if that were to be their permanent dwelling-place.
Ye Bibliographic Buccaneer
http://emporium.turnpike.net/Z/zen/PIRATES/BiblioBuc.html
Pirate Image Archive
http://www.piratehaven.org/~beej/pirates/
Delaware Art Museum's Guide to Howard Pyle - Pirates
http://www.delart.org/damdocent/pylepirates.html
Dirty Rotten Pirates Links Page
http://members.cox.net/dirtyrottenpirates/links.html
Pirates and Privateers
By Cindy Vallar
http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/pirates
(Site Excerpt) WELCOME to Pirates and Privateers: The History of Maritime
Piracy! Join me each month as I investigate the world of pirates, past and
present, and introduce you to infamous swashbucklers in search of treasure.
A Guide to Maritime Research on the Internet
http://ils.unc.edu/maritime/home.shtml
(Site Excerpt) Welcome to my web pages on Maritime History on the Internet.
I hope to create a site that guides visitors in methods of doing maritime
history research on the internet. Throughout these pages, you'll see that
I believe you must use print resources and libraries to do comprehensive research,
but as resources become available on the internet I hope to highlight them
and bring them to your attention here.
NAVIGATION AND RELATED INSTRUMENTS IN 16TH-CENTURY ENGLAND
http://www.nps.gov/fora/navigation.htm
(Site Excerpt) By the dawn of the sixteenth century, the ancient art of navigation
had begun to develop rapidly in response to oceanic explorers who needed to
find their positions without landmarks, to determine the locations of their
discoveries, and to establish routes between the new-found lands and home.
Although the relationship of certain heavenly bodies to time of day and terrestrial
directions had been known since ancient times, the first two decades of the
sixteenth century saw the rigorous application of astronomy and mathematics
to navigation. The new learning met the New World.
Wreck databases and lists
http://www.abc.se/~m10354/uwa/wreckbas.htm
Tudor Navigation and Seamanship (MaryRose site)
Synthesis of an article by the late Peter Whitlock
http://www.maryrose.org/lcity/pilot/tnotes.htm
(Site Excerpt) Navigational science of the period was a rather hit or miss
affair, particularly out of sight of land, and was basically to remain so
until the mid 18th century. The tools of the pilot or navigator in Tudor times
were relatively crude. The spyglass, later to be called the telescope, did
not evolve until the early part of the 17th century, and a means of scientifically
anticipating the weather was not available until the arrival of the barometer
in 1643. No adequate survey of the British coastline existed until the the
end of the 16th century.
Magnetic Declination Charts for Historical Epochs
http://www.phys.uu.nl/~vgent/magdec/magdec.htm
(Site Excerpt) Researchers in the history of cartography, navigation, exploration
and geomagnetism are well aware of the fact that a compass needle on Earth
only approximately points to true North. As the geomagnetic poles lie at some
distance from the geographical poles, the deviation of the compass needle
(known as the 'magnetic variation' by mariners and 'magnetic declination'
by geophysicists) can vary considerably over the Earth's surface and can be
directed either to the East (positive) or to the West (negative).
Stefan's Florilegium: Pirates throughout the Middle Ages
http://www.florilegium.org/files/CULTURES/pirates-msg.html
(Site Excerpt from a message on the subject of Pirates) In the period 1200-1300CE,
you could easily have been an English pirate almost anywhere in the European
world. In the eastern Med, as a holdover from a Crusade, former Saracen prisoner,
or participant in the wars involving the shattered Byzantine Empire, the Turks,
Venice, and the Frankish Morea. in the western Med, the dispute between Aragon
and the HRE over Sicily, the continuing wars between Christian and Muslim,
the wars among the Italian cities In the Atlantic, the disputes between the
English and French (cf earlier message re Eustace), the wars between England
and Scotland. and in the Baltic, the various disputes among the Hansa cities,
the Scandinavian kingdoms. Basically, whereever there was trade by sea, there
have been those who made a living by piracy or privateering. So -- choose
where and when you want to be; as long as you have the sea, you have pirates
in our period
Pirate punishments and pirate sexuality
Punishments for buccaneers, outlaws and masculine antiheroes by squaddie
John © 2003
http://www.milism.net/pirate.htm
(Site Excerpt) The seventeenth century pirates lived by their own rules outside
the law. In the times of the Royal Navy's press gangs, "going pirate" had
considerable appeal for those who had nothing more to loose; it meant jumping
ship naval or merchant. Pirates weren't lawless - pirate crews had pirates'
rules and ship's agreements. These varied between communes where the rule
was "one for all and all for one", including sharing the proceeds of piracy
and raids. Life on-board ships run by the well-known pirate captains were
mostly benign dictatorships run by consent rather than coercion. Pirate captains
who attempted to perpetuate their rule as complete tyrants were mostly cruelly
disposed of after mutinies of pirate ships companies.