Pieces of Eight – Pirate Trivia to Shiver Your Timbers

1. The word buccaneer comes from a Tupi word for a frame; used in Central American smoke houses where long strips of meat were barbecued over a wood-chip and dung fire. The word soon became applied to the hunters who provided the meat and was latterly used to refer to the hunters of the sea – pirates. Pirates known as buccaneers were most active in the middle to late 17th century.

2. Most people casually presume that captured pirates faced severe barbarity from their captors. This is not true; in most cases they were landed in open spots where there was a high chance they would be picked up well and safe. Either that or they were given the opportunity of signing up for a life of piracy.

3. Nicknames for pirates were very diverse. Louis le Golif had the nickname Borgne-Fesse; attributed to him because someone had slashed off one of his buttocks with a cutlass.

4. One of the most famous pirate captives of all time was Julius Caesar. He was taken prisoner, on his way to Rhodes, by the pirates that dominated the Mediterranean in the first century BC. He was held hostage until the ransom money was paid. The other captives aboard were bound up and thrown overboard.

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5. One of the pirates favourite weapons was known as the ‘stink pot’. It was made from saltpetre, asafoetida and limestone, packed into earthenware jars, ignited and lobbed on to the deck of enemy ships. The resultant smell was so bad it often caused the enemy to beat a fast retreat.

6. The unruly pirate is an image created for the movies. The truth was, at times, much different. Most pirates followed a set of rules and regulations. Lights and candles had to be extinguished by 8pm. If any of the crew wanted to drink after this hour they had to do so on the deck with no lights.

7. Buried treasure would appear to be one of the largest myths afforded to pirates, for that we have Robert Louis Stevenson to blame. There has been much more money spent on looking for pirate treasure than has ever been found.

8. Many of the crewmen on privateers and pirate ships wore trusses to ease the symptoms of hernias; caused by the constant heavy pulling and lifting that happened in the day-to-day running of the sailing ships.

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9. Throughout the 17th and 18th century, captured or volunteer musicians were numerous on pirate ships. They provided background music to the drinking binges. They also served as military bands, creating a ferocious din as the pirates closed in on their enemy.

10. Privateeringwas formally abolished by the Declaration of Paris in 1856. This didn’t stop the prize money from the sale of ships and cargo captured by the Royal Navy being distributed on a fixed scale; the system operating right up to the end of the Second World War.

11. One of the strangest tales about pirates occurred in Scotland in 1880. The 350-ton Clyde coaster Ferret disappeared and was assumed lost somewhere in the Western Isles. Over a year later, it turned up in Melbourne, Australia. It had been taken to South America and then South Africa before arriving in Australia. The crew and skipper were caught after trying to sell the ship off.

12. John Paul Jones, during the American War of Independence, achieved most of his success under the petticoats of ladies. Some ladies got together to sew and American flag from their underwear. The flag was flown from Jones’s masthead.

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13. Portobello, the ‘seaside resort’ of Edinburgh, took its name from a Caribbean pirate port which serviced Peru and Chile. A sailor on his return to Scotland (and perhaps with too much romance in his heart) named the strip of beach to the east of Edinburgh after the exotic West Indies location.

14. Think of pirates and before long you will be thinking of walking the plank. Sad thing is though, that is another movie fabrication. There is only one recorded incident of anyone ever being forced to walk the plank on a pirate ship. Instead, they were more likely just to be thrown overboard.

15. Why did pirates wear golden earrings? Because they believed it gave them sharper eyesight. That wasn’t a joke by the way, they really did believe that.