Pillaging the Empire Global Piracy on the High Seas, 1500-1750

Between 1500 and 1750, European expansion and global interaction produced vast wealth. As goods traveled by ship along new global trade routes, piracy also flourished on the world’s seas. Pillaging the Empire tells the fascinating story of maritime predation in this period, including the perspectives of both pirates and their victims. Brushing aside the romantic legends of piracy, Kris Lane pays careful attention to the varied circumstances and motives that led to the rise of this bloodthirsty pursuit of riches, and places the history of piracy in the context of early modern empire building. This second edition of Pillaging the Empire has been revised and expanded to incorporate the latest scholarship on piracy, maritime law, and early modern state formation. With a new chapter on piracy in East and Southeast Asia, Lane considers piracy as a global phenomenon. Filled with colorful details and stories of individual pirates from Francis Drake to the women pirates Ann Bonny and Mary Read, this engaging narrative will be of interest to all those studying the history of Latin America, the Atlantic world, and the global empires of the early modern era.

List of Tables, Maps, and Figures Preface and Acknowledgments Preface for Second Edition A Chronology of Early Modern Piracy in the Americas Introduction 1 Spain and the Sixteenth-Century Corsairs 2 Smugglers, Pirates, and Privateers: The Elizabethans 3 From the Low Countries to the High Seas: The Dutch Sea-Rovers 4 The Seventeenth-Century Caribbean Buccaneers 5 Buccaneers in the South Sea 6 The Last Buccaneers and Pirate Suppression Conclusion Appendix 1: Table of Early Modern Pirates and Contemporary European Monarchs Appendix 2: Piracy in the South China Sea Glossary of Terms Select Bibliography Index About the Author

Kris Lane holds the France V. Scholes Chair in Colonial Latin American Historyat Tulane University. He is the author of Colour of Paradise: The Emerald in the Age of Gunpowder Empires and Quito 1599: City and Colony in Transition. He is currently writing a book on the colonial history of Potosí, Bolivia.