HIST 120 - Pirates!

Credits: (3)
Stories about pirates, privateers, and other seaborne raiders have captured the popular imagination for as long as people have traveled across water. The “Golden Age” of piracy (from about 1650 to 1726) has provided the Caribbean with some of its most memorable legends. “Pirates” provides a foundation in the key themes, events, controversies, and individuals involved in Atlantic and Caribbean piracy before, during, and after the “Golden Age,” why they were important at a particular point in a particular place and why they ceased to be so. The purpose of the class is to introduce and discuss how people in, and connected through, the Atlantic World from the 1500s to the 1700s answered questions about piracy related to the above themes, and how these issues have shaped the popular portrayal of Caribbean piracy since the 18th century.