A Presentation for the IPMI Conference 2003 Puerto Rico

摘要

The myth and reality of piracy in the Caribbean rivet the attention and let loose the imagination of young and old alike. "God, Glory and Gold" is a time-honored slogan that sums up much of the motivation fuelling the rape and conquest of the New World that followed the epochal voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492. Piracy, an essentially criminal aspect of the European discovery and occupation of the Americas, had its roots in the ancient world of the Mediterranean with Phoenician raiders even before Greek and Roman pillaging by sea helped build their empires. The Viking raiders of the North Sea region in the early Middle Ages are another example of primitive sea-borne vandals. Piracy continues today in the South Seas of Indonesia and the Philippines and elsewhere. Our interest, however, focuses on the Caribbean when it was a pirate-infested lake of the Spanish Empire from 1521 (the conquest of Mexico) to 1898 (the Spanish American War).