Recommendations for Pirate Books?

by FarrenD

(I tried looking at the book list, but something seems to have gone wrong with the pirates portion of it and all I'm seeing is a bunch of website code)

I like to occasionally make posts about pirate history on Twitter. I stopped for a while, because I'm no historian and I don't know how to detect what's questionable and what's not, and I don't want to spread misinformation. An acquaintence on Twitter recommended me this subreddit and your book list.

I've read a lot of stuff by David Cordingly, and I'm interested in just about anything pirate history related, not just the GAoP. Also - and I'm not sure if this counts as history related - I'd love if there's any recommendations for books on pirate related myths and legends.

Iwashmyself

Hiya FarrenD! I'll see if I can help you here with a bit of a list.

I know you asked for books but I put a few cheeky articles in there. (If you can't get access to them at a library to pm yeah?)

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--Bandits at Sea: A Pirates Reader :

  • an excellent place to start any further reading if you have not gotten around to this. A fantastic selection of topics of piracy across time and space. A great overview of the spectrum of piracy and a good place to begin looking for further sources.

--Sodomy and the Pirate Tradition: English Sea Rovers in the Seventeenth-Century Caribbean

--Fisher Godfrey, Barbary Legend: War, Trade, and Piracy in North Africa, 1415-1830

  • Will get you out of the golden age and out of the Caribbean. Nicely looks at the various intersections of 'piracy' in North Africa.

--Claire Jowitt, The Culture of Piracy 1580-1630

  • as the name implies, would read if you have not.

--Margaret Lincoln, British Pirates and Society, 1680-1730

  • A fantastic look at the British public's interaction and conceptions of pirates. Provides an interesting way looking at pirates and piracy during the period.

--Susan Ronald, The Pirate Queen, Queen Elizabeth I, er Pirate Adventurers, and the Dawn of Empire.

  • Looks at the complicated role of identifying pirates, the roles of 'pirates' and 'piracy' in empire.

--Hans Turley, Rum Sodomy and the Lash: Piracy, Sexuality, and Masculine Identity

  • so much more than Rum Sodomy and the Lash.

--BA Ellerman, et al, Piracy and Maritime Crime: Historical and Modern Case Studies

  • A great overview of piracy from about 1400s up to the present.

--Robert Antony (ed), Elusive Pirates, Pervasive Smugglers: Violence and Clandestine Trade in the Greater China Seas.

--Stefan Eklöf Amirell, Persistent Piracy: Maritime Violence and State-Formation in Global Historical Perspective

  • Again sticking with the theme of notions of piracy, use of piracy, and piracy's role in state or empire.

--Philip De Souza, Piracy in the Greco-Roman World.

  • An interesting look at apply widely accepted definitions of piracy into the classical world and thus illuminating both how we define it and the complications to which it brings about but a fun look at piracy in a period which is mostly ignored in popular culture.

--David Starkey, et, al. (eds), Pirates and Privateers: New Perspectives on the War on Trade in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries:

  • Really, anything by Starkey on piracy is a good read. This article is a nice move into how commerce, trade, empire and war, interact and intersect with piracy.

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Journal Articles

--SL Dawdy , "Towards a General Theory of Piracy" Anthropological Quarterly 85, 2012:

  • As name implies, a good look at the complications of what piracy is and how we define it.

-- Kathryn Reyerson, "Identity in the Medieval Mediterranean World of Merchants and Pirates" Mediterranean Studies 20, 2012.

  • An interesting look at changing identities and social/communal views of what constitutes piracy.

--Marcus Rediker, "Life Under the Jolly Roger" The Wilson Quarterly 12 1988

  • Without question should be read as well as anything else by Rediker.

--Anderson's “Piracy and world history: An economic perspective on maritime predation.” Journal of World History 6, 1995.

  • A rather Classic example of the interaction between Piracy and Economy. the global-ish(academic debate between Journal of World Hist and Journal of Global Hist and practice) is very interesting.

--Nagatsu Kazufumi, "Pirates, Sea Nomads or Protectors of Islam? A Note on 'Bajau' Identifications in the Malaysian Context" Asian and African Area Studies 1, 2001.

  • Maybe one of the most interesting articles i have read on how complicated the label pirate and piracy is.

--Nino Luraghi "Traders, Pirates, Warriors: The Proto-History of Greek Mercenary Soldiers in the Eastern Mediterranean" Phoenix 60, 2006

  • If you want to see just how far we can push the complication of defining piracy.

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Fun Primary source

  • E.T Fox, Pirates in Their own Words: Eye-Witness Accounts of the Golden Age of Piracy 1690-1728