From Blackbeard to Juqraafi: The history and art of maritime piracy

You must have heard about the Pirates of the Caribbean movie franchise. Or perhaps you are still hung up on Assassin's Creed: Black Flag and its disappointing spiritual successor Skull & Bones. But while Jack Sparrow, Edward Kenway and many other characters are fictional, one truth prevails: the Caribbean was indeed the epicentre of the Golden Age of Piracy, roughly between the 17th and 18th centuries. 

Maritime piracy has existed since ancient times, and according to the British Royal Museums Greenwich, "pirates threatened the trading routes of ancient Greece, and seized cargoes of grain and olive oil from Roman ships. The most far-reaching pirates in early mediaeval Europe were the Vikings."

However, Christopher Columbus, in his quest to find India and establish trade routes between Europe and the Far East, ended up establishing trade routes between Europe and America on account of "discovering" the latter. Of course, in the late 15th century, it was known as "new lands." 

Columbus was working for the Spanish monarchy which laid claims to his new lands "and soon they discovered them to be rich sources of silver, gold and gems," according to the Royal Museums Greenwich. 

"From the 16th century, large Spanish ships, called galleons, began to sail back to Europe, loaded with precious cargoes" — this lured in pirates and saw pirate attacks intensify. So much so that these galleons were forced to sail together in fleets with armed vessels for protection. 

Edward Teach (1680 – 22 November 1718), better known as Blackbeard, was an English pirate who operated around the West Indies and the eastern coast of Britain's North American colonies. Photo: Collected

This should conjure scenes from the movie franchise and the video game. 

And as Spanish settlers set up new towns on Caribbean islands and the American mainland, these too came under pirate attacks. Famous historical pirates who operated in the Caribbean include figures such as Blackbeard (Edward Teach), Captain Kidd (William Kidd), Anne Bonny and Calico Jack Rackham, among others.

Perhaps a little far-reaching, but in the history of piracy, Columbus seems to have a hand in the Golden Age of Piracy. This period also includes "the pirate round" in the 1690s when pirates from the western Atlantic travelled around Africa's southern tip into the Indian Ocean, and even north into the Red Sea.

There was also a period in the late 1600s when Anglo-French seamen based in Jamaica and Tortuga attacked Spanish colonies and shipping in the Caribbean — another part of the Golden Age of Piracy. 

Closer to home, "In 1498, Vasco Da Gama 'discovered' India via a route the Arabs had been using for at least two millennia before him. The Portuguese, though, meant business and their superior naval firepower soon displaced the Arabs from India's west coast. 

"Not long after, the Iberians had the entire Indian coast at their disposal, from Chittagong in Bengal to Bombay (as they named it) in the Konkan," wrote journalist Shoaib Daniyal in Scroll. 

The same famed Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama looted and then torched a Muslim pilgrim ship — the act of piracy — sailing between Calicut and the Red Sea in 1502. American writer Lewis Lapham argued how da Gama "was also a fierce Christian crusader" in Bloomberg, noting that he burned alive around 300 people, including women and children. 

In the 1600s, "The Portuguese in Dhaka are not to be confused with the ones who were engaged in piracy and pillaging together with the Maghs [or Moghs were Arkanese/Burmese] along the coast of Bengal, Swandip and Arakan (present-day Myanmar). In Dhaka, the Portuguese were mostly missionaries and merchants," according to the Bengal Institute.

The century also saw Dutch merchants in the subcontinent. "The Dutch were probably involved in piracy and slave trading like the Portuguese in the 1620s along the Bengal coastline," according to the Institute. 

The Bay of Bengal suffered through a period of deadly piracy at the hands of Portuguese-Arkanese in the 17th century. 

It was in the 18th century, when the British "arrived" that they, in their own interest, cleared the Bay of Bengal as well as the Indian Ocean of pirates.

Anne Bonny sometimes Ann Fulford, was an Irish pirate operating in the Caribbean, and one of the few female pirates in recorded history. Photo: Collected

By the 18th century, European nations bolstered their navies, offered protections for merchants and hunted down pirates. This eventually saw the downfall of the golden age. 

However, pirates remain in the seas today, even though their golden years date back three centuries. 

In the 21st century too, geopolitics play a hand in the most "pirate-infested" waters (the Gulf of Aden/Horn of Africa, the Strait of Malacca, The Gulf of Guinea, the Red Sea and the Singaporean Strait). 

Let's begin with the Gulf of Aden/Horn of Africa — one of the most pirate-infested waters in the world. The Gulf forms an important trading route leading into the Suez Canal and is geographically well-positioned with Somalia. This is where Somali piracy thrived. The pirates devoured the geographical and logistical advantage of the close proximity to the Suez Canal. 

Before Somali piracy peaked in the late 2000s, its own coastlines were exploited by illegal trading by foreign ships. Due to the complete breakdown of its central government in 1991 and the instability which ensued and sustained, Somali's waters were open for the game. 

Its weak, or perhaps absent, maritime security enabled the foreign entities. And later, it was the Somali pirates who thrived in the lawlessness of their own land, lack of regulation and chaos that continued their criminal record in international waters. 

The Gulf of Guinea (West Africa), another highly pirate-infested waters, also suffers from weak or absent maritime security due to a lack of strong governance and regional stability.   

On the other hand, The Straits of Malacca (the link between the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea) is a critical maritime choke point (900 km long but only 1.7 km wide) between the Malay Peninsula and the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It has been vulnerable to piracy due to geopolitical tensions, territorial disputes and economic interests. 

Captain William Kidd (c. 1645-1701) was a Scottish privateer turned pirate who, despite only ever capturing one significant prize ship, has become legendary thanks to the persistent rumour he buried a fantastic treasure that nobody has yet found. Kidd was arrested, sent to England, and hanged in Wapping Old Stairs in 1701. Photo: Collected

In 2005, Indonesia's military commander General Endriartono Sutarto told a news conference, "We want to show the international community that we are serious about securing the Malacca Strait."

This was in reference to an agreement between Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore to start coordinated air patrols over the pirate-infested Malacca Straits, according to a 2005 New York Times story.  

The US had previously proposed sending troops to protect the strait. But Washington's proposal met strong resistance from Malaysia and Indonesia, which said they welcomed other countries' offers to help them strengthen their defence capabilities, but not to intervene directly to boost security, according to the NYT story. 

Piracy feeds off weak local governments or political unrest which historically have existed in the Strait. In modern times, increased demand for shipping (around 25% of the world's traded goods and around 94,000 ships pass through this Strait each year) and the narrow passageway also make it an easy target for pirates.

Maritime security analysts say a combination of factors — both on sea and land — contributed to the pirates' near-total defeat. "Most significantly, the success in the strait shows how concerted and well-coordinated action by regional governments can prevent pirate attacks on commercial shipping," wrote journalist Michael Shuman in Time magazine. 

"From Roman times to the Barbary pirates, throughout history, the reasons [for resolving piracy] are always the same," said Pottengal Mukundan, director of the International Marine Bureau in London, in the Time Magazine story. "For pirates, it becomes a much riskier activity. That is really the deterrent." 

The case of the Singaporean Strait is more recent. According to a 2023 Channel News Asia (CNA) report, the rise in sea robbery cases around the strait is driven by socio-economic issues. And perpetrators usually target ships that are ill-prepared, manoeuvre at slow speed and have low freeboard.

Krishnaswamy Natarajan, executive director at the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia's (ReCAAP) Information Sharing Centre, said the increase in such incidents was driven by a socio-economic situation worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic, lower fish catch due to climate change and the prevailing Southwest monsoon, according to the CNA story. 

Meanwhile, the Red Sea has been making headlines again in recent months. Houthi rebels launched attacks on ships and cargo to disrupt the global supply chains. Since this is what the experts say constitutes "piracy" — these pirates had a unique agenda. They announced that their attacks would stop when Israel stopped bombing Gaza. 

While Houthi's agenda at the Red Sea remains unfulfilled and met with counter-collaborative attacks from the West, this is not the only kind of piracy which the Red Sea lived through. 

"The recent history of the Red Sea reads like a macabre thriller, from industrial-scale hostage-taking by pirates to tit-for-tat naval attacks between Israel and Iran in international waters to unchecked drug and arms smuggling," wrote author Nicholas W Stephenson on Foreign Policy. 

He argues how colonialism brought havoc onto the Red Sea. 

"The pre-colonial history of international relations in the region is not only a rich and fascinating tapestry; stories and customs excavated from before the 19th century could be a lifeline for a region plagued by colonial modernity. 

"The alternative is intensifying anarchy, militarism and international competition," wrote Nicholas, who authored Colonial Chaos in the Southern Red Sea: A History of Violence From 1830 to the 20th century. 

"Colonialism created chaos in the Red Sea in two ways. First, European rulers carved the region into a patchwork of highly militarised, patronage-seeking, mutually competitive states. Second, colonialism sowed the seeds of civil division," he added.

The Red Sea remains one of the most pirate-infested waters in the world.