Earrings? Help settle an argument

[corsair2k3]

Greetings,

Am looking for a 17th or 18th century reference source for the allegation that sailors of that era indeed believed that wearing a gold or silver earring would improve vision.

Thanks in advance,

The Corsair

[Firethorn]

Check out the link below, hope it helps ya.

Why Did Pirates Wear Earrings?

[Silver Steele]

Recently, this was a topic of discussion on another board. Here is what I posted at that time:

One must remember that during the days of travel on the high seas, sailors would find themselves in lands of different ethnic groups than their own. History shows many different cultures utilized body piercing (and various other types of body modifications) for either ritual reasons, religous beliefs, medical superstitions or social status. Examples would be African tribes (since tatts would not show up on their dark skin), Asian cultures, and Indian cultures (American, Mayan, South American) just to name a few. Esquemling states in his book in reference to the Indians of Darien and their king or chief captain "In his nose he wore a large plate of gold in the form of a half moon, and in each ear a great golden ring, nearly four inches in diameter, with a round think plate of gold of the same breadth, having a small hole in the centre, by which it hung to the ring."

Since many pirate crews were made up of African slaves, (speaking specifically of the pirates in the Caribbean region, using Blackbeard's crew for an example) it would be reasonable to believe that some pirates did wear earrings, along with other piercings in various body parts. As ships began finding themselves in the Med and in Asia seas, again, they would find themselves in cultures that did utilize ear piercing, again for social and ritual reasons. (Currently the University of Penn Museum is showing an exhibit on the history of piercing.)

In Pyles book, although you have to kinda take some of what he says as fictional, he states "Two men were bending over him -- one, a negro in a striped shirt, with a yellow handkerchief

around his head and silver earrings in his ears;" and "The vessel in which they sailed was a brigantine of good size and build, but manned by a considerable crew, the most strange and outlandish in their appearance that Barnaby had ever beheld -- some white, some yellow, some black, and all tricked out with gay colors, and gold earrings in their ears, and some with great long mustachios, and others with handkerchiefs tied around their heads, and all talking a language together of which Barnaby True could understand not a single word,". This supports my belief that some pirates that had backgrounds from different cultures could have infact worn earrings, considering that crews were sometimes made up of a motley crue of various nationalities.

It would be not be unreasonable to believe that during times in history when piercings were the rage that some pirates did wear earrings, such as Francis Drake, which I have found several references to him wearing earrings. Have I found any paintings, drawings, or plates of pirates wearing earrings? No. The only reference I have found to jewlery is a painting of B. Roberts, and his infamous diamond cross necklace.

So with all that in mind, would it not be reasonable to believe that a "few" pirates did indeed wear earrings, but that would have been the exception and not the rule. And if they did wear them, it would have been because of their cultural background, and not for use as a deterrant in combat.

There is a reference to an old Dutch Maritime law stating that a sailor must wear a earring to pay for his funeral if he is washed overboard, drowns and washes up on shore. To this day, I still haven't been able to find a good source for Dutch Maritime law to research this statement.

In reference to how an ear would be pierced in past history. One example I found is the Canela of Brazil who to this day still use a hardwood awl to pierce men's ears. (From the National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution) The Bible also states the use of an awl for ear piercing. "And his master shall pierce his ear with an awl" (Exodus 21:1-6)

I also found this tad bit of information also:

In 1635, the ROEBUCK, under Captain William Cobb, was attacking shipping of the "infidells" in the Indian Ocean under the authority of a specious commission issued by King Charles I. In a deposition, a victim of their robberies took note of "the leftenant Franglee who hath a ring in his left hear." - From Pirates of the Eastern Seas, by Charles Grey.

[corsair2k3]

Greetings,

Good answers thus far--but anything that shows that the sailors in question actually believed it would improve vision?

Thanks in Advance,

The Corsair.

[Silver Steele]

Greetings,

Good answers thus far--but anything that shows that the sailors in question actually believed it would improve vision?

Thanks in Advance,

The Corsair.

For that, you're gonna have to prove they wore the stupid things in the first place. And trust me, Im always on the look out for such info.

[Lady Seahawke]

http://www.mailbits.com/goto/pirate.htm

http://www.imponderables.com/new2.html

http://www.unsolvedmysteries.com/usm116025.html

http://education.vsnl.com/aptech_ltd/diduknow.html

most these say basically the same thing…as this one...

Did pirates wear earrings?

Evidently so. Our resident pirate expert, Toby Gibson (librarian and historian, who has made a lifelong study of pirates) writes:

"While I'm sure Hollywood was trying to make leading men such as Errol Flynn and Douglas Fairbanks, Sr, look suave and exotic, real pirates were piercing their ears for a more practical purpose. It was believed that piercing the ears with such precious metals as silver and gold improved one's eyesight. This was the main reason pirates performed such a ritual. It must also be noted that most other seafaring men men also indulged in this practice.

"While for years this was considered an old wives' tale, today the art of acupuncture lends some credence to the practice of ear piercing. The earlobe is an acupunture point for several eye ailments. It is quite possible that the practice of ear piercing may have been brought to the West from the Oriental trade routes."

[Silver Steele]

Unfortunately Howard Pyle wrote his book about 150 years after the Golden Age and the book is generally accepted as a work of fiction. If you look at the classic plates of pirates, such as those at Beeji's archive, the pirates there are not wearing earrings. In Defoes Books, or Ellms "The Pirates Own Book", or even Esquemeling's book "The Buccaneers of America" there isn't an instance of an earring mention in any of those books. Im not arguing that they didn't wear earrings mind you, I believe that some did wear them. It's just proving that they did wear them.

[corsair2k3]

Greetings,

I was just wondering if any of the expert scholars here had seen primary source evidence showing that earrings were worn for any reason other than decoration.

It's not like tattoos--18th century sailors had them and it can be reasonably argued that some sailors had them done for religious reasons as well as decoration since many of the reported designs had religious themes.

But since a perceived relationship between earrings and better vision cannot be determined solely from the nature or appearance of the object, I was looking for some evidence for the existence of that belief among sailors of that period.

Thanks for all your input!

Regards,

The Corsair

[Fox]

I wasn't going to get involved on this one, but I now admit I have a problem. Hi, my name's Ed and I'm an historian, I last posted to a thread about earrings 9 days ago... Silver Steele knows where I'm coming from...

As SS says, before you can even think about WHY pirates wore earrings we must first answer the question of WHETHER they wore earrings. Evidence from either side of the Golden Age is not necessarily very useful, for example: the Lieutenant Franglee on the Roebuck can be shown to be wearing an earring, but that is at a time when earrings were generally fashionable (though on their way out of vogue) so it's not really surprising. By the late 17th/early 18th century earrings were pretty much out of fashion amongst most Europeans and Americans so proof of pirates wearing earrings at that time would be quite surprising, and would indicate a break from the normal practices of the day. As Steele says, a minority of pirates (and indeed other seafarers and landlubbers) might well have worn earrings, but they were a minority until someone produces a credible source to say otherwise.

Our resident pirate expert, Toby Gibson

I'm afraid that no "expert's" word can be taken at face value unless they can produce sources to back up what they're saying.

The gist of those articles sems to be that since modern acupuncturists have discovered an eyesight related point on the ear lobe that must be why pirates pierced their ears, but:

a. They've not been able to show that pirates generally DID pierce their ears at all

b. There's no evidence that pirates knew about acupuncture

c. The same acupuncture expert also said that piercing ears WOULD NOT lead to significant improvement in sight, so we can rule out trial and error, and

d. Acupuncture and piercing are not the same thing.

Franglee, Drake, and all those other early pirates who can be shown to have worn earrings wore them because they were fashionable. By the Golden Age earrings were not fashionable and suddenly all the evidence for pirates (and other sailors) wearing earrings disappears - coincidence or conspiracy?

So Corsair, I reckon that until someone comes up with actual reliable period evidence to support any idea about why pirates wore earrings we'll just have to accept that all the neat theories are mostly twaddle. Course, that's just my opinion based more or less on what I wrote above.

[corsair2k3]

That's about what I'm reckoning--now to print out this thread and waddle off to show it to the blockhead I've been arguing with.

Regards,

The Corsair

[Fox]

On another board (the one Steele mentioned) we once tried to compile a list of all the reasons people have put forward for pirates wearing earrings. The results were staggering, over 100 posts if I remember correctly!

And you know what? Not ONE single theory had any credible evidence to support it.

In the end the question was settled by Hiram V. Noodlewhacker Jr who told us all about a woodcut he's found which shows a pirate wearing an earring, from which is suspended a seed ring which the parrot on his shoulder is nibbling... mystery solved!

[Gentleman of Fortune]

Historical refrence for earings?

I was once... a long time ago in a discussion with someone about weather the head scarf-doo rag thing Pyle depicts was period or not.

Anyway.

How do you interpret Avery's flag. Google it if you can't find one.

Where do find the period discription of his flag?

TO me it looks like a skull wearing a doo rag AND and earing.

What say you?

[Fox]

TO me it looks like a skull wearing a doo rag AND and earing.

What say you?

I say: Maybe.

The rag tied round the head has other sources, most notably the trial of Bonny and Read. Mrs Dorothy Whatshername states (and I'm paraphrasing from memory here) that Bonny and Read were dressed as men, with a machete each and a kerchief tied around their heads. The intimation seems to be that the kerchief was a part of their disguise as men, ie. was common garb for seamen in that area at that time. Does anyone have the actual wording for that?

The Avery flag as usually depicted does definitely seem to show a rag and an earring, BUT there is some doubt about the authenticity of the Avery flag. As I undertand it, there exists a document in the National Maritime Museum, which depicts a whole load of pirate flags. Some of the flags depicted are either depicted or described elsewhere, but some are unique to that one document (Avery's included). Now, since the flags in that document have been copied and republished in almost every illustrated work on pirates ever printed they have become "fact", but there is some doubt as to how old the document actually is, who drew it, and whether they actually knew what the pirates flags looked like or not. It is, in short, a completely unverified source, but for many flags it is also the only source.

MAYBE the document is contemporary with the Golden Age of piracy, but maybe not. The woodcut of Avery prepared for Johnson's General History shows Avery with a different flag - simply 2 crossed bones, but of course, whoever made the woodcut might not have known what Avery's flag looked like, since it's not described in the text. What it shows though is that within living memory of Avery, the flag which is now associated with him was not popularly attributed to him at the time.

Personally, I am torn. On the one hand I had always believed it to be Avery's flag. On the other hand, now I know that it's not certain I can't help feeling that it looks a little too like a "typical" pirate of popular imagination, especially for a guy whose career was right at the beginning of the Golden Age.

[blackjohn]

TO me it looks like a skull wearing a doo rag AND and earing.

What say you?

The rag tied round the head has other sources, most notably the trial of Bonny and Read... Does anyone have the actual wording for that?

See this topic for some of that quote...

https://pyracy.com/forums/index.php?showtop...t=0entry71884

[Silver Steele]

In the end the question was settled by Hiram V. Noodlewhacker Jr who told us all about a woodcut he's found which shows a pirate wearing an earring, from which is suspended a seed ring which the parrot on his shoulder is nibbling... mystery solved!

*DING*

Okay Ed, so now your saying that pirates wore earrings, and all pirates had parrots.

Cheers!

....and for those of you who think Im serious in this post... WRONG! *ding*

[Fox]

I never said it, it was Hiram!

Bigger boys did it and then ran away - sounds like the sort of excuse Calico Jack would have used...

[Gentleman of Fortune]

Yes the doo rag thing Read/Bonney is also in the book "Under The Black FLag" (if i am not mistaken).

The Avery Flag is a conundrum though isn't it? I would imagine that even the Hollywood-Pyle pirate depiction have some kernel of fact that they base themselves on. Who knows?

I think that in this instance, the conscientious living historian should opt out of the earring thing until more concrete evidence is brought forth.

Maybe we will find some when they are finnished at the Queen AR and Wydah sites.

G

[Fox]

Copied from a different board, my opinion of where Pyle got his ideas from.

Actually, I'm beginning to incline towards the belief that pirates themselves never existed, and any evidence to the contrary was forged in the 1880s by Stephenson and Pyle to lend credibility to their work which came entirely from their imagination.

It answers so many questions! Who wrote the General History? Stephenson did. Then how come the writing style is more similar to Defoe's than Stephenson's? Stephenson wrote all the Defoe stuff. I mean, if Stephenson and Pyle invented pirates then Defoe couldn't have based Robinson Crusoe on Alexander Selkirk, because he never existed. Robinson Crusoe was written by Stephenson under the pseudonym of Defoe, then thought "Bother, nobody will ever believe that", so created the story of Selkirk to support the idea. But then he had to explain who had rescued Selkirk, so Woodes Roger's was born, and Dampier was invented so that Woodes Rogers would know where Selkirk was and who he was. Esquemeling's "Buccaneers of America" was written next to provide background for Dampier, and in the process created a whole host of other characters. Pyle then set to work on Sharpe's South Seas Waggoner while Stephenson got a team of monkeys to write Dampier's log and the journal of Lionel Wafer. Finally they had to come up with the General History to explain what happened to Woodes Rogers.

They would have got away with it too if Pyle hadn't forgotten to forge the evidence for earrings before he put them in his paintings.

[JoshuaRed]

Now that is ludicrous! After all, Dampier's grave is verifiable at his hometown in England...how could they forge that? Yeah, I know it's a sarcastic post. Very clever too. Seems on the same level as "The moon-landings in the 60's were faked" theory.

Anyway, here's my two bits: Bandanas/Do-Rags were worn to A: Soak up sweat while aloft so you wouldn't have to take hands off your grip risking life and limb to wipe your brow, and B: to help hold your hat securely on your head. And possibly C: to cover up that often filthy European head full of lice, dandruff and grease. :)

Earrings? I'm torn. I so want them to be real, but I have yet to find an verifiable period reference. Same with flags. I've always assumed that the flags depicted in Johnson's book are mostly made up. It seems logical to me that they would have to be unless eyewitnesses provided details. I think Blackbeard's and Robert's flags could well be real, as they were seen by so many people ashore at different times.

[Capn_Enigma]

Then how come the writing style is more similar to Defoe's than Stephenson's? Stephenson wrote all the Defoe stuff.

IIRC, wasn't Stephenson the guy who invented the locomotive?

Sorry, couldn't resist.

[Fox]

Faking a grave is easy! I mean, look what a good job they did of Elvis's.

[JoshuaRed]

Touche! How about the Whydah, Oxford and Queen Anne's Revenge? And Kidd's missing French Pass found 300 years later behind a drawer? It must have been a far reaching global conspiracy making Stephenson and Pyle utter genius madmen....I KNEW I always idolized Pyle for a reason! :)

[Red Maria]

It answers so many questions! Who wrote the General History? Stephenson did. Then how come the writing style is more similar to Defoe's than Stephenson's? Stephenson wrote all the Defoe stuff

Well considering GHP was first published in 1724 and Stevenson if you mean (you do mean Robert Louis Stevenson?) do was born in 1860. Even if you mean Robert Stephenson (inventor of the steam engine) was born in 1803. So either of these two gents would be hard press to have written for DeFoe. If Defoe, indeed, really existed or was really and all his work was written by Capt. Charles Johnson. <pulling Foxe's leg right back.>

Now that being said seaman (and pirates are seaman) have very little fashion sense so even if it wasn't fasionable for land lubbers to wear one they could have. I'm going to look around here for prints of late 17th c. - early 18th. c. prints of seaman and see if they arer wearing earrings or not. If they are then it is likely pirates wore earring too.

["Broadside" Long]

A 1588 portrait of Sir Walter Raleigh clearly shows him wearing an earring in his left ear. In addition, a 1583 portrait of Sir Francis Drake shows what appears to be a gold hoop in his left ear as well. Both of these men were illustrious mariners, so I believe that it is entirely plausible that pirates wore earrings. They were a superstitious lot.

I always heard that sailors wore earrings as a talisman against drowning, the improved eyesight is a new one on me. I've got both ears pierced and I still can't see sh!t.

Cheers,

Broadside

[Silver Steele]

A 1588 portrait of Sir Walter Raleigh clearly shows him wearing an earring in his left ear. In addition, a 1583 portrait of Sir Francis Drake shows what appears to be a gold hoop in his left ear as well. Both of these men were illustrious mariners, so I believe that it is entirely plausible that pirates wore earrings.

Broadside at the end of the 16th century and a little into the 17th, it was the style for men to wear earrings. And yes there are accounts of Drake wearing earrings at court. Unfortunately men wearing earrings went out of style in the early to mid 17th century and virtually all accounts of men wearing earrings disappeared.

Red Maria, good luck on finding a print/plate/woodcut from the late 17th to early 18th century of a sailor wearing an earring. I haven't found one yet.