Blood and Silver
Piracy in the Americas, 1500-1750

In this study of piracy, Kris Lane looks at the often mixed motives behind the phenomenon and the lives of those involved. Rejecting the romantic myth of the Elizabethan swashbuckler, he reveals a world of violence, hardship and fanaticism, in which self-enrichment was the obsession.

Pirates, privateers and buccaneers were the scourge of the Americas for two and a half centuries. Rejecting the romantic myth of the Elizabethan swashbuckler, this new and original study of piracy reveals a world of violence, hardship and fanaticism, in which self-enrichment was an obsession.