Historian and author Adrian Tinniswood brings alive this dynamic chapter in history, where clashes between pirates of the East-Tunis, Algiers, and Tripoli-and governments of the West-England, France, Spain, and Venice-grew increasingly intense and dangerous. They attacked ships, enslaved crews, plundered cargoes, enraged governments, and swayed empires, wreaking havoc from Gibraltar to the Holy Land and beyond. Pirates have existed since the invention of commerce itself, but they reached the zenith of their power during the 1600s, when the Mediterranean was the crossroads of the world and pirates were the scourge of Europe and the glory of Islam. It's easy to think of piracy as a romantic way of life long gone-if not for today's frightening headlines of robbery and kidnapping on the high seas.
The stirring story of the seventeenth-century pirates of the Mediterranean-the forerunners of today's bandits of the seas-and how their conquests shaped the clash between Christianity and Islam.
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