Uncovering the Truth of Pirates

Christopher Columbus   Chris Columbus is remembered by most as a hero. He is the person who "discovered" North and South America and bought Europe and the rest of the world to this newly discovered land for colonization. But is Columbus actually a hero or was he actually the villain of this story? On October 12th, 1492 Christopher Columbus changed the world by discovering the island of the Lucayan tribe, which changed the course of both the world and the people of this tribe. When Columbus discovered their home, the people of the Lucayan tribe were welcoming thinking that this man who came from the sea was actually sent from heaven, offering him shelter, food, and water. Columbus, on the other hand, took this opportunity and ran with it. He took woman and children as slaves, loading them back onto his ships for the trip back to Spain and killed anyone who protested to this. 30 years later, Columbus discovered the island of Hispaniola. Hispaniola was home to the Luc...

The Golden Age of Piracy gave way to many different myths and legendary tales about great pirates like Blackbeard and Bartholomew Roberts. But are many of the well-known legends of the Pirates of the Carribean actually true?  Woodcut portrait from the 1700s There are a lot of different myths surrounding the pirate of the mid to late 1600s and into the early 1700s. One of these myths being that all Pirates were lawless. In reality, a lot of the pirates that we think of from this time period actually were Privateers. This means that notable pirates like Sir Henry Morgan and Sir Francis Drake were actually given seals by the King of their respective countries to be out in the open waters and pirate from ships belonging to other countries.  These Pirates, under the authority of their King claimed riches and treasures from various ships and settlements of other countries and claimed them to return to their homelands. There were of course, privateers like...

Treasure Island, published in the early 1880s, gave us many different stereotypes about Pirates that are still used to this day. Everything from pirate captains having a parrot sidekick to walking the plank can be traced back to this book.  Over the course of history, there have been many parts of a pirate's life that most people assume we're part of an average pirate's everyday life . Many of these stereotypes were brought into the world by Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, Treasure Island.  Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson Cliché such as peg legs and parrots are also rooted in literary myth. Long John Silver, the main villain of  Treasure Island, had a peg leg and parrot that was often depicted to be sitting on his shoulder. It is also thought that Captain Ahab from the book Moby-Dick  by Herman Melville could also have helped lead to this thought, as often in the book he is described as having an ivory leg. Other stereotypes that have been...

The cast of the show Critical Role I am currently a nineteen year old college student who is majoring in English. I enjoy reading, writing and drawing. Recently, I have started to play Dungeons and Dragons, which is a table top role playing game. I was introduced to this game via the online internet show Critical Role, which is my favorite show to watch. I also am an accomplished bowler, winning a bowling tournament a few years ago.