HIST-102 Lecture 60: Pirates
14 Oct 2020
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Document Summary
The sea beyond the harbors, being under no government"s jurisdiction, was literally a place without law and hence no activity there could be illegal. M ost pirates were themselves merchants, and piracy was regarded as one of the natural risks of conducting business; a merchant assumed that risk in deciding to undertake maritime trade in the first place. So long as pirates did not commit unnecessary violence and did not attack ships in harbor, they were regarded as extra-legal (as opposed to illegal) nuisances. No particular opprobrium was attached to them or their way of making a living. Since rivalries and hatreds lurked just beneath the surface, most cities, as they grew in wealth and size, found it necessary to divide their civic territory into discrete neighborhoods. Merchants from abroad won special privileges that granted them the right to inhabit these merchant-residences, trade in the markets, and have access to the harbors.
