It was off this island that John Gow, the pirate, was taken in 1725.

The great pirate city was not in fact thoroughly tamed till its conquest by France in 1830.

One tablet records that in 1631 two Algerine pirate crews landed in Ireland, sacked Baltimore, and carried off its inhabitants to slavery; another recalls the romantic escape of Ida M'Donnell, daughter of Admiral Ulric, consulgeneral of Denmark, and wife of the British consul.

In 1541 Francisco de Orellana discovered the whole course of the Amazon from its source in the Andes to the Atlantic. A second voyage on the Amazon was made in 1561 by the mad pirate Lope de Aguirre; but it was not until 1639 that a full account was written of the great river by Father Cristoval de Acufia, who ascended it from its mouth and reached the city of Quito.

The word appears in French as pirate for a liquid measure as early as the 13th century.