Patterns of Pillage
Subtitle: A Geography of Caribbean-Based Piracy in Spanish America, 1536-1718 (American University Studies Series Xxv, Geography)
Publisher: Peter Lang Publishing; Lang Publishing, Incorporated, Peter
Published: December 1998
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 271
ISBN-13: 9780820437712
Subjects: Caribbean Area - History; Historical Geography; History; History - General History; History: World; Earth Sciences - Geography; Maritime History; Caribbean & West Indies - General; Caribbean Area; Pirates
Description: Patterns of Pillage offers a fresh, geographical perspective on the story of piracy in and around the Caribbean. It focuses on places associated with the sea rovers of Spanish America: routes, targets, hideaways, rendezvous, and island strongholds. Why did pirates - the likes of Francis Drake, Henry Morgan, and Blackbeard - haunt particular places? How did their spatial strategies develop and change over the centuries?

Much of the explanation lies in geographic factors such as winds, ocean currents, coastal features, maritime bottlenecks, historical geopolitics, merchant traffic flow, and the distribution of natural resources. All contributed to patterns of piracy that connected the Caribbean Sea to the Gulf of Mexico, Cape Horn, and beyond.