Pirates Of Barbary
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Pirates Of Barbary: Corsairs, Conquests and Captivity in the 17th-Century Mediterranean for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
`Tinniswood is a masterly writer of history with a gift for slamming his readers into the thick of the action.' -- Literary Review
'This rollicking book unpicks a confusion of names, dates and places to produce a fascinating history of seaborne conflict.' --Telegrpah: Review
'Tinniswood narrates this story with brio and bravura, displaying an excellent eye for the theatrical detail and juicy episode.'
--BBC History Magazine
"Tinniswood's absorbing book is packed with bad characters, big fights and breathless chases." --Daily Mail
`skilfully evokes the dread that corsairs aroused.'
-- FT
Tinniswood's artful blend of narrative and analysis brings the pirates' society to life. -- Spectator, Books, Blair Worden
`North African pirates were the scourge of the 17th century, and plundered as far as Cornwall. Tinniswood tells their story with verve' --The Telegraph
'This rollicking book unpicks a confusion of names, dates and places to produce a fascinating history of seaborne conflict.' --Telegrpah: Review
'Tinniswood narrates this story with brio and bravura, displaying an excellent eye for the theatrical detail and juicy episode.'
--BBC History Magazine
"Tinniswood's absorbing book is packed with bad characters, big fights and breathless chases." --Daily Mail
`skilfully evokes the dread that corsairs aroused.'
-- FT
Tinniswood's artful blend of narrative and analysis brings the pirates' society to life. -- Spectator, Books, Blair Worden
`North African pirates were the scourge of the 17th century, and plundered as far as Cornwall. Tinniswood tells their story with verve' --The Telegraph
Book Description
The incredible, action-packed secret history of Barbary Coast piracy in the 17th century, by the author of the acclaimed The Verneys
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Well written, well researched - and a huge amount of fun. Pirates of Barbary is filled with colourful historical detail, charismatic anti-heroes and a pointed, but not over done, resonance between the Pirates of Barbary then and now. Absolutely loved it.
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Having enjoyed Adrian Tinniswood's The Verneys so much I thought I'd read this too. And I'm glad I did. Pirates of Barbary is written in pacey, well defined chapters - charting different eras, themes and episodes.
This book is a must for anyone interested in the 17th century and maritime history, albeit one doesn't need to be solely interested in such things to enjoy the benefits of this book.
Adrian Tinniswood is slowly but surely creating a canon of scholarly but popular history books on the 17th century. Although I still think The Verneys is his best book, Pirates of Barbary is comfortably the most fun.
This book is a must for anyone interested in the 17th century and maritime history, albeit one doesn't need to be solely interested in such things to enjoy the benefits of this book.
Adrian Tinniswood is slowly but surely creating a canon of scholarly but popular history books on the 17th century. Although I still think The Verneys is his best book, Pirates of Barbary is comfortably the most fun.
11 of 12 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I thought I had enough pirate books, till I saw this one specifically dealing with the Barbary pirates of Algiers, Tripoli etc. It's well researched and scholarly but also written in a delightfully lively style - see this sardonic little piece on everyone's dream job - not...:
"The governorship of Tangier was not a passport to success. The Earl of Peterborough was recalled to England after 11 months, amidst allegations of corruption and incompetence. His successor, the Earl of Teviot, managed a year in office before being killed in a Moorish ambush. During a bout of diarrhoea the Earl of Middleton, who took up office in 1668, got up in the middle of the night, fell over his sleeping manservant and broke his arm; he died two days later. The Earl of Inchiquin was recalled in disgrace after allowing the Moors to overrun the outer defences, though he managed to calm the King's anger by giving him a pair of ostriches. The Earl of Ossory fell into a fit of depression on hearing of his appointment as governor and succumbed to a fever before he could even leave England."
Always keep a pair of ostriches handy. This book is full of unforgettable characters, rich historical ironies, absorbing personal stories and just sheer style, both Tinniswood's and that of his (anti-)heroes. Did you know Samuel Pepys, at very short notice, was ordered to go to Tangier to help supervise its evacuation and destruction? Or that the French mortar-bombed Algiers, in the teeth of a threat, which was carried out, to blow an elderly French priest from a cannon? My own favourite is the harassed Thomas Baker, neglected but kindly English consul in Tripoli, but he's only one in a bewildering tapestry, at a time and cosmopolitan place where people called Hassan Rais, who made a living by importing Christian slaves, frequently turned out to be someone called Rowley from Bristol. You can never have enough pirate books.
"The governorship of Tangier was not a passport to success. The Earl of Peterborough was recalled to England after 11 months, amidst allegations of corruption and incompetence. His successor, the Earl of Teviot, managed a year in office before being killed in a Moorish ambush. During a bout of diarrhoea the Earl of Middleton, who took up office in 1668, got up in the middle of the night, fell over his sleeping manservant and broke his arm; he died two days later. The Earl of Inchiquin was recalled in disgrace after allowing the Moors to overrun the outer defences, though he managed to calm the King's anger by giving him a pair of ostriches. The Earl of Ossory fell into a fit of depression on hearing of his appointment as governor and succumbed to a fever before he could even leave England."
Always keep a pair of ostriches handy. This book is full of unforgettable characters, rich historical ironies, absorbing personal stories and just sheer style, both Tinniswood's and that of his (anti-)heroes. Did you know Samuel Pepys, at very short notice, was ordered to go to Tangier to help supervise its evacuation and destruction? Or that the French mortar-bombed Algiers, in the teeth of a threat, which was carried out, to blow an elderly French priest from a cannon? My own favourite is the harassed Thomas Baker, neglected but kindly English consul in Tripoli, but he's only one in a bewildering tapestry, at a time and cosmopolitan place where people called Hassan Rais, who made a living by importing Christian slaves, frequently turned out to be someone called Rowley from Bristol. You can never have enough pirate books.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Yo-ho-ho! But it wasn't all fun
The 17th Century neatly bookends the story of piracy in the Mediterranean. For a few decades the protagonists struggle on but in reality by the end of Adrian Tinniswood's... Read more
Published 20 months ago by G. M. Sinstadt
Enjoyable and thought provoking
I went into a local bookstore and the shop assistant asked me if there was anything I was specifically looking for. Read more
Published 20 months ago by Adam Bartleby
A good read
A good narrative with plenty of action on a subject which deserves a book. The scale of piracy and captivity, and its economic significance, are clearly brought out. Read more
Published 22 months ago by David Howells
Boring, boring, boring
I started to read this book because the author is coming to my local library. I would never normally read this kind of book and trying to read it reaffirmed my dislike for this... Read more
Published on 7 May 2010 by TotallyMadH
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
- Books > Biography > True Crime
- Books > History
- Books > Reference > Transport > Ships > Maritime Reference
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
