Knowra Pirate flag Pirate flag A flag associated with pirates, used to identify a vessel or threaten those it approached. The best-known design is a skull and crossbones, but historical pirate flags varied.
Jolly Roger : A pirate flag, especially one bearing a skull and crossbones or another emblem of death. The name most closely associated with the pirate flag and its threatening imagery.
Golden Age of Piracy : A period of widespread maritime piracy, roughly spanning the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Many of the pirate flags now remembered come from this period.
Surrender : The act of yielding to an opposing force rather than continuing resistance. A threatening flag could encourage a target ship to surrender without a prolonged fight.
Blackbeard's flag : A flag attributed to Blackbeard, commonly depicted with a horned skeleton and a bleeding heart. Its imagery is a prominent example of a design linked to an individual pirate.
Skull and crossbones : A symbol consisting of a human skull above two crossed bones, often associated with death or danger. Its familiar form became the emblem most widely associated with pirate flags.
Bartholomew Roberts : A Welsh pirate active in the early eighteenth century, known as Black Bart. Accounts associate Roberts with several distinctive flag designs, not just one standard emblem.
Boarding (maritime law) : The act of entering a vessel from another vessel, often for inspection, capture, or combat. If a warning failed, pirates might board the vessel they had approached.
Bartholomew Roberts's flags : Several flag designs associated with Bartholomew Roberts, including images of a pirate and a skeleton. The differing designs challenge the idea that pirates used one universal flag.
Flag of truce : A flag used to signal a request for communication or a suspension of hostilities. Pirates could use a plain flag of truce to approach before revealing a threatening flag.
Edward Teach : An English pirate active in the early eighteenth century, better known as Blackbeard. A flag attributed to Blackbeard shows how pirate emblems could combine skulls, weapons, and a skeleton.
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