Calico Jack

More 1780-1812 than GAoP, but I'm interested in the civilian cravat of the period as an option to the military neck-stock . There's a wide variety of partial descriptions and partial instructions out there on "the internet," but I was wondering if anyone had dug up a concise description and instructions [both manufacture and tie] for a civilian cravat - yes, most likely white linen rather than black, being civilian rather than military. What would have been a likely knot for the post-Rev War period?

Any help most welcome.

Just want to add my compliments to those of the crowd -- _beautiful_ work!

Bearing in mind, of course, that the original post wasn't asking after GAOP appropriate gear -- it was a query as regards "all sorts of brass instruments and suchlike" found in popular images of "photos" of naval charts on rough-hewn table, and such like. All those "geometry" instruments are not GAOP back-staff but rather typically (a) sextant, ( dividers, © sometimes parallel ruler, (d) sometimes chronometer, (e) often compass. It's usually mid-1800s-era stuff in such illustrations. As all this appears not to be for an "authentic reenactment" ...

... Should there perhaps be a thread dedicated to the appropriate navigation instruments of the GAOP?

https://pyracy.com/forums/index.php?showtop...4&hl=navigation

https://pyracy.com/forums/index.php?showtop...3&hl=navigation

http://science.msfc.nasa.gov/ssl/pad/solar...untime/expt.htm

- build a simple sextant [depending on period, you could be building an octant or quadrant instead, but hey...]

http://boatsafe.com/navigation/intronav.htm

- dividers and parallel rulers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronometer

- and finally, a Wikipedia page on the history of the ship's Chronometer.

That should be most of the tools you find scattered about "on top of" images on nautical charts. Occasionally an actual compass as well. Most rarely:

http://www.navyandmarine.org/planspatterns...ns/speedlog.htm

- the chip log.

Ahoy, folks. Whilst there's plenty of piratical history up here in Eastern Canada [running from 1602 through 1844], there's not so much in the way of Pirate Crews. Looking to touch base with crews from Eastern Canada or Northern New England ... shopping 'round, like.

So, here's the hook.... Any takers? Or am I down to jigging without bait?

A quick note as regards "which clothes did they wear?"

Yes, admittedly, this is once again stealing notes in part from later periods [but my focus is admittedly on the 1812 period, with the Lafittes et al], but here is:

Whilst Grania "Grace" O'Malley may have been noted as famed for "shaving her head" and leading from the fore [even being once captured on a boarding action], those ladies aboard later, Naval vessels were more of a mixed bag:

Thanks to those aboard Victory at Trafalgar, there are a number of accounts of that ship and that battle. Not only do we know that several individuals were _born_ aboard those vessels during the battle [thus a strong acknowledgement of the Warrants' wives aboard ships], but we know for certain and by name of at least a couple of Warrant Officers' wives aboard Victory herself.

One, the wife of a Gunnery Officer, switched to men's slops during the battle of Trafalgar so as to act as Powder Monkey [and then as Loblolly Boy]. This suggests that (a) outside the battle she did _not_ wear slops, and that ( during the battle, even though everyone knew she was a woman, she dressed and acted the part of a Ship's Boy.

No, this does not guarantee any such occurance during the Great Age of Piracy, but it does mean that those pirates active during the War of the American Revolt and the War of 1812, and the Napoleonic era, do have this to fall back on, should the ladies wish to dress the Boy's role...

The game is, in essence, "Perudo," a "Liar's Dice" game which dates back to the mid 1500s [perhaps farther, but why speculate?]. As such, if the dent to your coin seems a bit much, try searching up Perudo on ye olde internette to find some rules, gather one cup and five dice per player, and have at 'er!

Bein' as I work at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic in Halifax, NS, we're doing a full "talk like a pirate day" theme at the museum for the full day. That evening, it being a Tuesday, I'll be in full cinematic pirate regalia [as opposed to historical pirate less-regal-ia], for my Ghost and Folklore Tour of the museum. Earlier in the day, I'm at a local elementary school, so I figured I'll just stay in costume and find piratey-type stories for the library "classes."

The implication in the "British Frigate" service in 1740 reference, is that rather than being a Pirate, she instead may have served legitimately aboard a British Warship [likely originally as the wife of any of a number of lesser officers], but acted in a direct role during some combat engagement. For other examples on record, consider the wife of one gunner aboard Victory at Trafalgar, who served during that engagement first as Powder Monkey, then as Loblolly Boy... So she _may_ not be a pirate at all ['though I've no information of certainty either way]. You might do best to look up the frigate by name, and see what _she_ and her crew were up to in 1740....

And of course, there's a new book out looking at trying to patch together a biography of the brothers Lafitte - most definitely criminals and pirates rather than American Patriots - who were distinctly French in origin, but not GAoP [more late Napoleonic/War of 1812].

Ahoy folks. As a related aside, does anyone have the location of an e-text of the Lionel Wafer book [english or french, I care not which]? Would be most welcome.

Monkey steals coin at the end of POTC and monkey is now undead. Where is the coin?

[...]

Jack stole a ring from Tia Dalma and is wearing it opn his thumb correct? And it resembles the music box that Davey Jones has?

In fact the identity and origin of the Voodoo Queen [Tia Dalma] seems to raise most of my curiosity. She was obviously [in her capacity as "pirate movie voodoo queen"] the means of raising Barbossa, and likely the hat [found by Jack during the first visit] and the monkey [and its coin?] likely played a role in her crafting his return.

As noted above, 'tis not the _ring_ Jack steals, but rather the pendant on the necklace next it, being apparently identical [or at least oddly similar] to the music-box pendant sitting on Jones' organ.... My own pet theory is that Tia Dalma is that "woman as changing as the sea" from her version of the story. But we'll see.

Overall, parts of this film were slightly better than the first film, parts of it were worse, but it averages out as almost as good as the first movie, in my mind. Fun.

Found more history on the game - a thread on sailors' games [including Liar Dice] and their provenance is also current in Captain Twill.

https://pyracy.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=7956

And quick notes: losing dice changes the odds for _everyone_, although yes whoever is still in the lead now knows for certain a _slightly_ higher percentage of the total dice, compared to someone who has lost one or more of theirs. That changing ratio is a part of the game mechanic, and one of the things I like about it is that it is not exclusively a betting game [and adding poker chips instead _would_ make it exclusively a betting game]. Also, bidding five "5s" means exactly that - that amongst the total dice on the table [known or hidden], at least five of them are showing the number 5.

Aha!

So, current theory on the origins of Liar Dice, according to a number of at least semi-reputable sources [that is to say, better trhan Milton Bradley or Wikipedia]: Sometime roughly around 1530, a dice game was brought to Spain by sailors from their "American Trade" [as it were]. This _may_ have originally be a Native American game, as it holds some similarity to Incan dice games, but this provenance is speculative. What is known is that it spread amongst the Spanish-speaking peoples [probably including sailors, as it was brought from North America] as the game "Perudo" - forms of this game also appeared thereafter ['though when is uncertain, the multinational nature of ships' crews until the end of the 1700s at the least, makes transfer from one culture to another by sailors reasonable] amongst French and English, in English known as "Bluff" or "Liar Dice." Perudo is what the Liar Dice game in PotCDMC was based closely upon. Note that a number of other bluffing dice games are _also_ called Liar Dice, but seem to have no direct relation to Perudo.

So it _seems_ that Disney and company may well have got it right. If Perudo or Liar Dice did originate in MesoAmerica and did get adopted by the Spaniards there, it likely made it to the Spanish Main amongst sailors, and thus would spread by the multinational nature of ships' crews.

Lady Barbossa,

Just checking that the Fool's Gold got there past the border guards [grins]. It was posted over a week ago -- any sign yet? Also, thanks to a wide assortment o' folks, the ships and crew I'm looking for is becoming a shorter and shorter list. At this point, it's largely becoming the historical personages from the first set or three. The fictional pirates I've lots of. The historic ships and crew are a [to me] much more interesting theme. That said, I'm quite envious of Mr. Straw for pulling a successful Monkey Island theme - haven't the Sea Monkey yet, myself. The marketing switch with the current movie and all is, however, quite understandable.

Ahoy all.

Here at the Museum, we regularly show off some Sailors' games, knowing their history and how far back they go in the British Navy and merchant service, etc etc. Games such as quoits, Nine Men's Morris, and Hazard. With this Disney film showing off Liar's Dice, I expect it to have a sudden soar in popularity, as well as visitors telling _us_ about it, whenever we're talking about Hazard.

A quick search back through a number of text sources indicate that just about everybody seems to be quoting each other in that it is supposedly "centuries old" in the Royal Navy, but no one seems to supply dates or sources. Anyone know how old Liar's Dice [or its variants] actually _is_ in the Royal Navy? The Spanish Navy? Whomever? What's its actual history?

Yes, I know that gambling aboard ship even in the Great Age of Piracy often included dice gambling, but that may well have been Hazard [which is similar to Craps, but at _least_ as complicated in its rules]. What's the skinny on Liar's Dice?

Ah, Winston, but p'raps Bob isn't looking for something on the computer, but rather for something a wee bit more .. tangible. Or perhaps something involving sociability -- and thus miniatures gaming [toy soldiers] and roleplaying gaming [uh .. roleplaying] can be an excellent pass-time.

The rules for Wizkids' Pirates series are fast and loose. Whilst there are a few internet communities who discuss said rules, it seems that just about everyone changes 'em. Which is fine. Take 'em where you will.

I also concur that _if_ you are looking for a "d20" based Pirate Role Playing Game, _Skull & Bones_ by Green Ronin is your best. For a non-d20 system, the old 7th Sea system by Alderac captures a very cinematic and swashbucking experience. Or of course, just _adapt_ whatever role playing rules you already know [Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu rules could work well, Risus is a free and very flexible rule set available on-line...].

Like any Board Game, these games are about sociability. Individual Pirate scale miniatures [15mm to 28mm] are enjoying a resurgence. Reaper makes a bunch, Wargames Foundry in the UK makes loads, even Privateer games makes a few undead pirates. They're cropping up all over.

For a combination of geekery and piracy, the current Disney movies have created a renaissance.

Been away from the forums for a while, and so only just noticed this thread. Myself, I was a trombonist for years, and technically I suppose I still am, with a specialization in blues and jazz, but a fair hand at marching band stuff as well. Play the trombone less these days, but a good eight years of regular play and performance.

In 1990-or-thereabouts I roomed with a now Anglican Priest who was a fiddler, and introduced me to the traditional irish frame drum (bodhran); since played properly [so say the Irish I know] the mostion is much that of the trombone slide hand, I took to it quickly and easily. Now it's the one as gets the most practise. A right rousing sound the beast has, too.

Ahoy, all.

Working in the Public School service plus the Maritime Museum up here, means that I get but rare chances for travelling. I'm already lookin' at a rare trip south to Connecticut in late August, afore the new school year starts up, and so thought to have a browse for anything during taht time. An' it _looks_ as though only Toronto, Ontario, has anything piratically-inclined that's not in May or December! [Well, a slight exaggeration, but...]

Anyone know of anything on the Eastern Seaboard that's coming up in mid- to late-August? Since I'll be on the prowl, and all.

the flags & pennants only fit on the ships backwards, against the wind!:

Well, the _flags_ all fly nose to the wind, true, but the pennants can be just as successfully mounted in either facing. Just because Wizkids puts them backwards in all their photos, doesn't mean that we who "know better" can't do it the Right way.

As for islands, I'm looking at building a few myself. If anyone has managed (like me) to come into a free copy of Games Workshop's old Mighty Empires game, they'll find that the little villages and towns are just the right size to look appropriate for the _islands_ scale in PotSM (not the ship scale, which is obviously a different scale entirely).

Less interested in the submarines, in all ['though a fan of Steampunk, so I won't find one or two totally remiss], but more concern that it'll water down the overall theme for those just getting into the sets [just as Junks and Galleys did - to a lesser degree - in those expansions]. That said, attempts at submarines [with some success] date back to before the Great Age of Piracy, so it's not _that_ far afield.

The Mercenaries idea will be good specifically for those just joining, since the implication is that they can work on ships of any nationality [no more the woes of finding, say, all French ships, but only Spanish crew]. Of course, locally when we do play, we just use the convention of ignoring the nationality of non-named crew [since they have the same crew for everyone, if you find 'em].

Of the greatest interest to me is what they do with the Islands... The idea of Island effects should combine well with Terrain effects to make for an interesting game, _without_ adding too many new rules-as-such to the game [since Islands should have plenty of space for the printing of their effects right on the card].

In fact, my only qualm with the run at present is the swiftly increasing number of Keyword effects that need to be looked up on the rulesheet, instead of being written out on the ship templates. So long as they don't keep adding two such to each expansion, we should be okay, but so many Collectible games fall down to the ever-expanding-rules problem. In that the rules are fairly loose, it's not as much a problem with this game, but either looking up effects for so many keywords (if you use wizkids' rules), or making up effects for so many keywords (if you don't), well.....

I've the Phantasma from the first set, and am looking for the Phantasma from the newest set, but I have to admit he's fairly low down in my "trading desires." That said, I'm one of what appears to be few people playing locally, and there's _no_ organized play up here. (Organized by the players that is, rather than by Wizkids.)

P'raps I should start something up amongst the Museum crowd up here.

Anyhow, I must admit I'm overall more a fan of the "giant squid" sea monsters than of the "sea serpent" sea monsters, but I suppose that's my Historical Interest creeping in. Also a fan of their occasionally blending in the Real Folks amongst the fictions.

And yes, glad to hear from the Lady that they've included the "Fool's Gold" amongst the Davey Jones ships. One is on its way.

Calico Jack

Pay attention again now. Here's another historical artifact, this one from a nautical collection.

Scary looking 8 &1/2 foot Whip kept by a Ships Captain. The owner tells us that it's made of canvas and leather and dates from the middle 1800's. "The rigid 'cone' at the tip which appears to be very fine hemp rope work."

I reckon it was a snake Whip that's had the end chopped off, but dont tell Captain.

The above is from that page [link posted in the message above] which claims to be a "ship's captain's whip that's had the end chopped off." Rather it looks much to be a "manrope" - a line held or lashed over the side of a vessel to give someone a "hand up" as it were, with the knotted end being something to brace your grip with, were you climbing up the side. One of many on-line images of the Manrope knot can be found at http://www.stairropes.com/knots.html - these days the knot is used "merely" as the terminal to the manrope which acts as a handrail on the sides of the gangway [which bit of line is still called the "manrope," by the by]. It was also one of the only bits of "rope" aboard ship, instead of being called "line." The three "ropes" were bolt rope, boat rope, and manrope.

Australian heritage fleet news even makes a mention in their on-line journal for May 2002: <<Manrope knots were formerly tied in the ends of elaborate manropes, which were often coach whipped, painted, fringed, tasseled, decorated with Turk’s heads. They were hung from stanchions in the rails and provided a handhold for visitors coming on board. They were normally tied in four-strand rope now impossible to get.>>

Hope that's useful, even if it denounces _one_ of the "whip used aboard ship" theories. We even have one in the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic's collection. A quick google search turns up that apparently the book "Eighteenth-century rigs and rigging" by Karl Heinz Marquardt includes a chater on the manrope or "entering rope."

Calico Jack

Ah, now, not all Myth and "slighty adjusted history for the sake of a good story" comes from the that website, by a long shot ['though it is a nice one]. My putting "Mythtory" in quotations was not an attempt to cite the site, but rather a reference to my not really believing it to be a proper word...

Tell someone in Newfoundland that there's no Easton myths, and you're opening up an hours-long discussion over the ballad [yes, musical and poetic ballad] of Princess Sheila and the Pirates. Aim to tell anyone in Savoy [near present-day Monaco] that there's no history, and they'll tell you about the Marquis...

It's just the rest of us outside those areas as haven't much heard of him, as his reputation [once England, France, and Spain considered him a terrible blight and near unassailable in his fortified port - to the point where the Spaniards begged England to deal with this "notorious pirate"] seems to have - like that of Bart Roberts - fallen by the wayside in popular culture; whereas Blackbeard and Morgan have remained, even if details of their histories have generally fallen to fiction.

Anyhow, enough from me, 'til I find out more history. And nice site, by the way.

More on Easton, the successful pirate...

Seems he signed out, yes, in 1602, as a quiet privateer for Queen Liz to 'harry the Spaniards' in the New World. Elizabeth after all didn't like the Spanish, but liked to keep that a secret from the Spaniards. Ah, those English "Sea Hawks."

Anyhow, in 1603, a small difficulty cropped up for Easton and company. That problem was named King James. James who liked the Spaniards. James who _particularly_ liked the Spaniards to know James liked the Spaniards. So James had Easton [who was in the Americas at the time] declared pirate.

"Mythtory" has it that the first Easton learned of his new status is when the 'pirate hunters' started trying to collect the bounty. Whether that is true or no, I'm not sure [evidence in either direction is welcome!]. Either way, Easton's response - whilst a-typical a career move for privateers - is certain. If James called him a pirate, well than a pirate he'd be. Counts vary, but some sources of numbers as legitimate as others claim up to forty ships and thousands of pirates under his command at various times throughout the rest of the decade, until 1610, when England called him a "notorious pirate." Apparently there's a bit of info from the diary of John Guy:

'John Guy records in his diary that Easton returned to Newfoundland in 1610 and 1612 with his fleet. Along the rugged coasts he swept everything before him like a barbarian, capturing ships, a cannon, and $100,000 worth of bounty. He even enlisted 500 more men for his crews, most of whom joined gladly, but some of whom were tortured into submission.

With his captured cannon, Peter Easton fortified Harbour Grace Bay, and a little island off the harbor still bears his name. He built a fort just east of Caplin Cove near the spot where the museum stand today. He made his headquarters across the bay from Harbour Grace on Kelly’s Island. '

There are other, even less "factual" stories in the Easton myth/history, such as the "Princess and the Pirate" story about Princess Sheila Na Geira and Gilbert Pike - supposedly en route from Ireland to elsewhere Sheila was captured by Dutch pirates, who were in turn captured by Easton's crowd.

Anyhow, here's some more sources on an interesting character, an interesting history, and an interesting [and still active] myth:

Davis, Mary. Sheila Nageira Pike: "Carbonear's Irish Princess"

"Gravesite of Irish princess could be tourist attraction", Evening Telegram, Saturday, May 10, 1986, p. A3.

Horwood, Harold. The Princess and the Pirates, Evening Telegram

Weekend Magazine, v.9, no. 29, July 18, 1959. p9-12.

Newfoundland Historic Trust. Ten Historic Towns. Newfoundland Historic Trust Publications, Volume II, 1978.

Captain John Smith published in 1629 that Easton was the wealthy Marquis of Savoy.