#000206
A General History of the Pyrates
Daniel Defoe (Captain Charles Johnson)
*A General History of the Pyrates* is the single most influential book ever written about pirates - the source, directly or indirectly, of nearly every popular image of the buccaneer. First published in London in 1724 under the name Captain Charles Johnson, it gathers vivid biographies of the great pirates of the so-called Golden Age: Blackbeard, Bartholomew Roberts, and the female pirates Anne Bonny and Mary Read among them. Part reportage, part moralizing entertainment, it mixes solid fact with embroidery, and historians still argue over where one ends and the other begins. This Lyons Press edition of 2004 makes the eighteenth-century text available to modern readers. For anyone curious about the real history behind the pirate legend - or about how that legend was manufactured - it is the essential foundational document.
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The author
The book appeared under the pseudonym "Captain Charles Johnson," and the real author's identity remains genuinely unknown. In 1932 the scholar John Robert Moore argued it was Daniel Defoe, and that attribution stuck for decades; later scholars (notably Furbank and Owens) dismantled the case, and the publisher Nathaniel Mist is among the alternative candidates.
The book
Published in 1724, A General History of the Pyrates collects biographies of contemporary pirates, weaving documented events together with anecdote and invention. Its portraits shaped the enduring popular idea of the pirate far more than any court record.
How to read it
Read it as both primary source and literature: indispensable for the Golden Age of Piracy, but to be handled with care, since its author was as interested in a good story as in strict accuracy.
For more context
Pair it with a modern history such as Colin Woodard's The Republic of Pirates to sort fact from flourish.
Sources
- Type
- Book
- Author / Maker
- Daniel Defoe (Captain Charles Johnson)
- Publisher
- The Lyons Press
- Place of publication
- Guilford, Connecticut
- Year
- 2004
- ISBN
- None
- Format
- Paperback
- Shelf
- Maritime
- Location
- Maine
Also catalogued as: “The History of the Lives and Bloody Exploits of the Most Noted Pirates” (former #109).