Persistent Piracy

Maritime Violence and State-Formation in Global Historical Perspective

S. Amirel,L. Müller,Kenneth A. Loparo

• Editorial: Palgrave Macmillan
• Año: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781137352866
• Categoría: History
• Categoría: Modern History

Spanning from the Caribbean to East Asia and covering almost 3, 000 years of history, from Classical Antiquity to the eve of the twenty-first century, Persistent Piracy is an important contribution to the history of the state formation as well as the history of violence at sea.

1

Piracy in Classical Antiquity

The Origins and Evolution of the Concept

Philip de Souza

International maritime law and leading international organisations in the field of maritime security differentiate the high seas crime of ‘piracy’ from the more generalised crime of ‘armed robbery against ships’, which is defined as a crime occurring ‘within the internal waters and territorial sea of a coastal State’.¹ This definition is in keeping with the modern legalistic assumption that all seafarers must be either private individuals who are subject to the law of one or more nation-states or the official military or police forces of a nation-state.

In the world of Classical Antiquity, however, nation-states were not the norm, and such states as did exist lacked the extensive juridical systems and law enforcement apparatus of modern states. Therefore, with regard to Classical Antiquity, piracy should be defined at a much more basic level as any form of armed robbery involving the use of ships. It is the use of ships that differentiates the modus operandi of pirates and the threat of piracy from banditry. Pirates can operate over longer distances and the actual or perceived danger of piracy can have a widespread effect on maritime trade and coastal security. While attacks were occasionally made on ships at sea, in Antiquity piratical attacks were most often directed against the land, particularly in the Mediterranean Sea, where the numerous islands and coastal cities provided ample opportunity to plunder property or livestock, as well as to seize captives for ransom or sale as slaves. The use of the term ‘robbery’ in this definition implies illegitimacy, but exactly where the line should be drawn between illegitimate piracy by outlaws and legitimate, state-sanctioned, violent plundering by military forces in warfare is not always clear. It is important to note at the outset that very few individuals or groups in history have ever deliberately chosen to describe themselves as pirates, although that label may have been applied to them.

In Classical Antiquity the label ‘pirate’ was frequently applied to a group by their political enemies in order to delegitimise them and their activities (labelled ‘piracy’) in the eyes of third parties, and at the same time to present those who were applying the labels to them in a positive light. The application of the label ‘pirates’ to certain maritime communities was more often than not a deliberate misrepresentation or distortion of the nature of those communities. It was intended to demonise them in contemporary eyes in order to justify imperialist aggression against them. Typically those applying the label ‘pirates’ wanted to disguise or divert attention away from the real motivations for their military operations, which were far less worthy than the suppression of piracy. Thus, while ancient historical sources make frequent mention of ‘pirates’ and the problem of ‘piracy’, we should not assume that the instances referred to were simply examples of armed robbery by men in ships whose status was unequivocally that of outlaws or criminals. In order to appreciate the fundamental significance of this point, it is necessary to review the history of piracy and pirates as concepts and to consider the origins, evolution and deployment of the vocabulary of piracy in Antiquity.²

The origins of piracy in early Greek literature

There is sporadic evidence for maritime-raiding and plundering in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Late Bronze Age, that is from the mid second millennium BC.³ However, the earliest example of raiders being designated with a word that can be translated as ‘pirate’ comes from the Homeric poems, written c.750–700 BC. On two occasions in the Odyssey men arriving in ships are addressed thus:

O strangers, who are you? From where have you come along the sea lanes? Are you travelling for trade, or are you just roaming about like pirates (leisteres), who risk body and soul bringing harm to other people?⁴

It is generally agreed that the Homeric poems reflect quite closely Greek society and culture of the early Archaic period (c.800–650 BC).⁵ The activities characteristic of those called leisteres in the Odyssey are very similar to those characteristic of the leaders of the Homeric Achaians. These warrior-aristocrats (basilees in Greek) practice armed plundering, both on land and in ships, which seems to be the principal means by which they achieve their status and wealth.⁶

The nature and functions of maritime raids are neatly encapsulated in a passage from the fourteenth book of the Odyssey, spoken by the returning Ithacan basileus Odysseus while he is pretending to be a Cretan aristocrat:

Farming I never cared for, nor life at home, nor fathering fair children. I revelled in long ships with oars; I loved polished lances, arrows in the skirmish, the shapes of doom that others shake to see. Carnage suited me; heaven put those things in me somehow. Each to his own pleasure! Before we young Achaians shipped for Troy I led men on nine cruises in ships to raid strange coasts, and had great luck, taking rich spoils on the spot, and even more in the division. So my house grew prosperous, my standing therefore high among the Cretans.⁷

In the seventeenth book, the disguised Odysseus continues the tale of his Cretan alter-ego:

But Zeus the son of Kronos brought me down. No telling why he would have it, but he made me go to Egypt with a company of pirates (leisteres) – a long sail to the South – for my undoing. Up the broad Nile and into the riverbank I brought my dipping squadron. There, indeed, I told the men to stand guard at the ships; I sent patrols out – out to rising ground; but reckless greed carried my crews away to plunder the Egyptian farms; they bore off wives and children, killed what men they found.⁸

It is significant that the disastrous outcome of this piratical venture is directly attributed to the will of Zeus. It is apparent here and elsewhere in the Homeric poems, and from other poetry of the Archaic and Classical periods (c.800–330 BC), that the will of Zeus is an expression of justice.⁹ The pirates have received the just rewards for their reckless deeds, but Odysseus, the heroic warrior-raider, is subtly, but tellingly, distinguished from the greedy, murderous pirates who were his temporary associates. He carefully avoids identifying himself as a pirate (leister). When maritime-raiding is carried out appropriately, that is with due deference to the will of Zeus and the limits of prudence, it brings wealth and status to the basileus who leads the raids. But when it is not carried out appropriately, that is when the raiders fail to heed the will of Zeus, it brings misfortune and death. Pirates (leisteres/leistai) and piracy (leisteia) are, therefore, ambiguous terms that certainly do not imply unconditional approval, but nor do they imply absolute condemnation.

The raid mentality in ancient warfare

Vincent Gabrielsen has argued that the kind of raiding and plundering that the Homeric poems describe was the basic form of warfare in the ancient Mediterranean world from about 750 BC onwards. It continued to be a major element of warfare, even when political communities became larger and more clearly defined, and the concept of warfare for territorial gain emerged.¹⁰ Gabrielsen has characterised this approach to warfare as the ‘raid mentality’. It was a widespread assumption of the right to practice violent acquisition of persons and property and, as states grew more powerful, to appropriate territory and the revenues derived from it. Raids could have multiple functions, including forcing the enemy to divert forces to the defence of vulnerable coastal areas, inflicting military, economic and psychological damage, obtaining vital funds and materials for the raiders and boosting their morale.¹¹ The principal narrative histories that are the main sources for the warfare of the ancient Greek and Roman world are dominated by major set-piece battles and sieges. Yet these narratives also recount hundreds of examples of maritime raids, showing the extent to which naval forces were deployed by those states that could command the necessary resources and manpower. Such raiding was not just a maritime phenomenon but, as we have already noted, the mobility that ships provided made seaborne raids far harder to defend against, especially if the targets were unprepared or the territory to be protected was extensive. Well-known conflicts like the Peloponnesian War (431–404 BC) and the Second Punic War (218–202 BC) provide plenty of examples.¹²

Gradually, during the Classical and Hellenistic periods of Greek history, and the Republican period of Roman history (c.500–30 BC), a broad consensus emerged in the Graeco-Roman world regarding the category of formally declared, or ‘legitimate’ warfare, which was war between political entities whose leaders justified the conflict with reference to injuries or slights suffered at the hands of their opponents. This category of war was distinct from informal raiding, which could not be so clearly justified and so might be more easily or appropriately labelled as ‘piracy’, characterised as ‘illegitimate’ and strongly condemned. The distinction between these categories was first articulated by Thucydides in one of the earliest examples of a narrative history.¹³ The development of a distinction between legitimate warfare and illegitimate raiding and piracy was, however, a gradual and uneven process. So...

Índice

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Figures, Map and Table
• Acknowledgements
• Notes on Contributors
• Introduction: Persistent Piracy in World History
• 1 Piracy in Classical Antiquity: The Origins and Evolution of the Concept
• 2 Ship-Men and Slaughter-Wolves: Pirate Polities in the Viking Age
• 3 Violence, Protection and Commerce: Corsairing and ars piratica in the Early Modern Mediterranean
• 4 A Hokkien Maritime Empire in the East and South China Seas, 1620–83
• 5 Maritime Violence and State-Formation in Vietnam: Piracy and the Tay Son Rebellion, 1771–1802
• 6 A Persistent Phenomenon: Private Prize-Taking in the British Atlantic World, c.1540–1856
• 7 Trade for Bullion to Trade for Commodities and ‘Piracy’: China, the West and the Sulu Zone, 1768–1898
• 8 Piracy, Security and State-Formation in the Early Twenty-First Century
• Select Bibliography
• Index