Thanks to media like Pirates of the Caribbean and Assassins Creed: Black Flag, the life of a pirate is almost romanticized to an extent. They show the bright sides of pirating, but how bad are the bad days, and what are the truths behind these Aquatic Brigands?
Pirates, well known as it is, are most simply defined as thieves and violent criminals who sailed the open waters. With as much as we know about pirates, it’s hard to pinpoint an origin, although the first pirates are believed to have come from the Mediterranean Region the 14th century B.C. More Specifically they’re referred to as the sea peoples, and come from the Aegian Sea. Pirates throughout history have been documented on Almost every continent, including Asia, Europe, Africa, and the Americas. For example, Barbary Corsairs were pirates that originated from various ports in North Africa.
The well known “Golden Age” of piracy took place between 1650 and 1730. The Golden Age mainly consisted of North American pirates raiding the Caribbean for loot. Hence the very aptly named movie series “Pirates of the Caribbean”. Piracy Most likely started out as sailors figuring it out that the easiest way to get rich was to just steal things, and then captured sailors being given a choice between working for the crew or taking a long walk off of a short plank. It’s speculated that famous pirates like Blackbeard and Calico Jack started out as normal pirates who figured out the “easiest way to get rich”. Some wealthy people became pirates but most commonly, pirates came from poverty searching for a better life.
Now that you know some of the history of these seafaring bandits, lets get into the logistics of how being a pirate was. Spoiler alert: not very good. Pirates ate literally whatever they could, due to their food supply dwindling while out at sea as well as the food being contaminated by mold. They often brought salted meat, sea biscuits, Sauer kraut, and bone soup (all things that stayed good for a long time). If they happened upon food while pillaging they took it, and the same went for livestock. they often kept cows for milk, and chickens for eggs. When they needed the meat they just killed the livestock, continued on pillaging, and finding more livestock. Rarely did pirates have the time to fish for food. One of the more popular drinks in the Caribbean as Rum, being made from sugar cane, was extremely common. Hence the Association. Rum was common but any wine, ale, beer or liquor found was stolen and put aboard the ship.
Pirates had very cramped sleeping spaces, most of the crew sleeping in a single room below deck. It was extremely cramped in these spaces, and for both ease of sleep and space they usually used hammocks. These Hammocks swayed with the boat as it went through the water and made it significantly easier to sleep. They had a decent place to sleep, but their hygiene was anything but. Any fresh water kept on board was used for drinking, not bathing, but most of the time they were so drunk they didn’t care how they smelled. There are some recordings of men being lowered into the ocean to cool off, but they never mention anything about using that to clean themselves.
But what did they do all day? Drink. By their own accord, almost all pirates were drunks and spent all of their free time tending to the ship and drinking. Other than this they pillaged villages and other boats for supplies, and that was about it as far as the life of a pirate goes. Due to this unhealthy lifestyle, they didn’t live very long on average. Not to mention scurvy, exposure to the elements, starvation, and hydration as issues, they also used horrific weaponry. They didn’t use slick weaponry like in the movies, the were reported to use mainly axes and dull cutlasses to hack away at one another, which for obvious reasons killed many even if they didn’t die from the initial wound.
Pirates were a scraggly bunch, and a brutal one. Blackbeard was known for cutting the fingers off women who wouldn’t give up their rings. With all this being said, you should now have a better idea of what pirates actually did and how they lived. I highly encourage you to delve into this topic on your own, as well as read my other articles.