Going on the Account: Examining Golden Age Pirates As a Distinct
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GOING ON THE ACCOUNT: EXAMINING GOLDEN AGE PIRATES AS A DISTINCT CULTURE THROUGH ARTIFACT PATTERNING by Courtney E. Page December, 2014 Director of Thesis: Dr. Charles R. Ewen Major Department: Anthropology Pirates of the Golden Age (1650-1726) have become the stuff of legend. The way they looked and acted has been variously recorded through the centuries, slowly morphing them into the pirates of today’s fiction. Yet, many of the behaviors that create these images do not preserve in the archaeological environment and are just not good indicators of a pirate. Piracy is an illegal act and as a physical activity, does not survive directly in the archaeological record, making it difficult to study pirates as a distinct maritime culture. This thesis examines the use of artifact patterning to illuminate behavioral differences between pirates and other sailors. A framework for a model reflecting the patterns of artifacts found on pirate shipwrecks is presented. Artifacts from two early eighteenth century British pirate wrecks, Queen Anne’s Revenge (1718) and Whydah (1717) were categorized into five groups reflecting behavior onboard the ship, and frequencies for each group within each assemblage were obtained. The same was done for a British Naval vessel, HMS Invincible (1758), and a merchant vessel, the slaver Henrietta Marie (1699) for comparative purposes. There are not enough data at this time to predict a “pirate pattern” for identifying pirates archaeologically, and many uncontrollable factors negatively impact the data that are available, making a study of artifact frequencies difficult. This research does, however, help to reveal avenues of further study for describing this intriguing sub-culture. GOING ON THE ACCOUNT: EXAMINING GOLDEN AGE PIRATES AS A DISTINCT CULTURE THROUGH ARTIFACT PATTERNING A Thesis Presented to The Faculty of the Department of Anthropology East Carolina University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in Anthropology by Courtney E. Page December 2014 © Copyright Courtney E. Page, 2014 GOING ON THE ACCOUNT: EXAMINING GOLDEN AGE PIRATES AS A DISTINCT CULTURE THROUGH ARTIFACT PATTERNING by Courtney E. Page APPROVED BY: DIRECTOR OF THESIS: _________________________________________________________ Charles R. Ewen, PhD. COMMITTEE MEMBER: ________________________________________________________ Tony Boudreaux, PhD. COMMITTEE MEMBER: _______________________________________________________ I. Randolph Daniel, Jr., PhD. COMMITTEE MEMBER: _______________________________________________________ Mark U. Wilde-Ramsing, PhD. CHAIR OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY: ________________________________________________________ I. Randolph Daniel, Jr., PhD. DEAN OF GRADUATE STUDIES: ________________________________________________ Paul J. Gemperline, PhD. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I want to thank my advisor and committee chair, Dr. Charles Ewen, for his continued support, advice, and patience during my thesis writing and for the many opportunities I was provided as a student, particularly my assistantship with the Queen Anne’s Revenge Conservation Laboratory, which developed into this thesis and subsequently my career. I also want to thank my committee members, Dr. Tony Boudreaux, Dr. I. Randolph Daniel, Jr., and Dr. Mark Wilde- Ramsing for their ideas, feedback, and above all patience throughout my research and writing. I appreciate the employees of the Queen Anne’s Revenge Conservation Lab past and present, including Sarah Watkins-Kenney, Mark Wilde-Ramsing, Shanna Daniel, Wendy Welsh, Terry Williams, Kimberly Kenyon, and Erik Farrell, for fielding my questions, discussions, and frustrations. I am grateful for the training and experience they have provided that has allowed me to develop into the professional I have become. I also want to acknowledge Dr. Linda Carnes- McNaughton for her archaeological guidance while developing my research, and David Moore, whose knowledge of both Queen Anne’s Revenge and Henrietta Marie were invaluable to this research. I would like to thank my fellow historical archaeology students, Amanda Keeny Stamper, Valerie Robbins, and Jennifer Gabriel, for experiencing this process with me and being an outlet for discussion and development of my thoughts. I particularly want to thank Amanda Keeny Stamper whose friendship has provided endless emotional support and continues to encourage me in work and in life. Most of all, I want to thank my parents, whose boundless care and concern for my education, wellbeing, and success, has meant more than I can ever express. The opportunities they have provided have encouraged me to love learning and taught me to never stop exploring and growing. TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................... iv LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................................... viii LIST OF FIGURES ....................................................................................................................... ix CHAPTER ONE: PIRACY AND ARCHAEOLOGY ................................................................... 1 Pattern Recognition in Archaeology ........................................................................................... 2 Contents ....................................................................................................................................... 5 CHAPTER TWO: THE GOLDEN AGE OF PIRACY .................................................................. 6 Introduction ................................................................................................................................. 6 Buccaneers .................................................................................................................................. 7 Peter the Great ......................................................................................................................... 9 Pirates of the 1690s ................................................................................................................... 10 Captain William Kidd ............................................................................................................ 11 Pirates of 1716-1726 ................................................................................................................. 13 Blackbeard ............................................................................................................................. 14 End of the Golden Age .............................................................................................................. 19 A Pirate’s Life ........................................................................................................................... 19 CHAPTER THREE: HISTORICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL BACKGROUND ................ 23 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 23 Queen Anne’s Revenge .............................................................................................................. 23 Ship History ........................................................................................................................... 23 Discovery and Excavation ..................................................................................................... 28 Conservation and Curation .................................................................................................... 31 Whydah ...................................................................................................................................... 32 Ship History ........................................................................................................................... 32 Discovery and Excavation ..................................................................................................... 35 Conservation and Curation .................................................................................................... 38 HMS Invincible ......................................................................................................................... 39 Ship History ........................................................................................................................... 39 Discovery and Excavation ..................................................................................................... 42 Conservation and Curation .................................................................................................... 43 Henrietta Marie ......................................................................................................................... 44 Ship History ........................................................................................................................... 44 Discovery and Excavation ..................................................................................................... 45 Conservation and Curation .................................................................................................... 48 CHAPTER FOUR: METHOD FOR DISCERNING A PATTERN............................................. 49 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 49 Artifact Groups .........................................................................................................................