Pirate Slang Dictionary

A greeting or hailing call used to get the attention of another vessel or person.

"Ahoy there, the Salty Crown. Stand down and prepare to be boarded!"

A command meaning "stop" or "hold fast." Comes from the Dutch "houd vast".

"Avast, ye fools. The reef is dead ahead!"

"Aye" means yes. "Aye-aye" means I understand and will carry it out.

"Reef the mainsail!" "Aye-aye, Captain!"

Before a storm, cargo hold covers were sealed by hammering wooden strips.

"Storm coming in hard from the northeast. Batten down the hatches."

The lowest section of a ship's hull where foul water collects. Also slang for nonsense.

"Don't listen to him. That's pure bilge he's been spouting all morning."

Plunder or stolen goods: treasure, cargo, and valuables taken from a captured vessel.

"Share out the booty equally, or you will have a mutiny on your hands."

Originally French hunters in Hispaniola who smoked meat on a "boucan" frame.

"The buccaneers of Tortuga were feared from Havana to Port Royal."

A short, broad, slightly curved sword used for close-quarters naval combat.

"He pulled his cutlass before the boarding party reached the rail."

A phrase for the ocean floor, the fate of sailors who drowned or were buried at sea.

"Another night like this and we will all be sent to Davy Jones' Locker."

A Spanish gold coin worth two escudos, common during the Golden Age.

"The chest held three hundred doubloons and a handful of rubies."

Diluted rum issued to Royal Navy sailors from 1740. Named after Admiral Vernon.

"Pass the grog, man. A sailor's thirst does not wait for sundown."

The skull-and-crossbones pirate flag, used as a tactical warning to demand surrender.

"Run up the Jolly Roger. Let them see who is approaching."

Dragging a sailor under the hull from one side of the ship to the other as punishment.

"Threaten it all you want, Captain, but keelhauling takes time we do not have."

A derogatory term for someone inexperienced or clumsy at sea.

"Those landlubbers from customs wouldn't know a bowsprit from a barrel stave."

To abandon someone on a deserted island or remote shore with minimal supplies.

"Vote against me again and I will maroon you on that sand strip to the south."

A declaration that no mercy will be given and all enemies killed.

"Run up the red. No quarter given today. They refused our terms."

A temporary truce to allow negotiation between enemies.

"Captain, they are flying a white flag. They want to parley."

Spanish silver coins (pesos de ocho), physically cut into smaller pieces for change.

"A thousand pieces of eight for the man who brings me that navigator alive."

A privately owned armed vessel commissioned by a government to attack enemy shipping.

"Francis Drake was a privateer with English backing, which is why Spain called him a pirate."

To deliberately sink your own ship to prevent capture.

"If the navy takes her, scuttle her. Don't let them sail our ship."

An exclamation of shock. First documented in 19th-century novels.

"Shiver me timbers. They've brought a man o' war!"

The classic pirate exclamation from Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island (1883).

"Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum!"