Arabian coins found in US may unlock 17th-century mystery

[FfFfFfFF 58,058]

A handful of coins unearthed from a pick-your-own-fruit orchard in the US state of Rhode Island and other random corners of New England may help solve a centuries-old cold case.

The villain in this tale: a murderous English pirate who became the world’s most-wanted criminal after plundering a ship carrying Muslim pilgrims home to India from Mecca, then eluded capture by posing as a slave trader.

Jim Bailey, an amateur historian and metal detectorist, found the first intact 17th-century Arabian coin in a meadow in Middletown.

That ancient pocket change – the oldest ever found in North America – could explain how pirate Capt Henry Every vanished.

On 7 September 1695, the pirate ship Fancy, commanded by Every, ambushed and captured the Ganj-i-Sawai, a royal vessel owned by the Indian emperor Aurangzeb, then one of the world’s most powerful men. Onboard were not only the worshippers returning from their pilgrimage but tens of millions of dollars’ worth of gold and silver.

Historical accounts say Every’s band tortured and killed the men onboard the Indian ship and raped the women before escaping to the Bahamas.

Until now, historians knew only that Every eventually sailed to Ireland in 1696, where the trail went cold. But Bailey says the coins he and others have found are evidence that the notorious pirate first made his way to the American colonies, where he and his crew used the plunder for day-to-day expenses while on the run.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/apr/01/arabian-coins-found-in-us-may-unlock-17th-century-pirate-mystery

[David Ward 9,613]

Fascinating! Thanks for sharing!

[danbekim 3,065]

thank you for sharing! this is so cool

[bionic 50,111]

2 hours ago, FfFfFfFF said:

 

 

The villain in this tale: a murderous English pirate who became the world’s most-wanted criminal after plundering a ship carrying Muslim pilgrims home to India from Mecca, then eluded capture by posing as a slave trader.

 

On 7 September 1695, the pirate ship Fancy, commanded by Every, ambushed and captured the Ganj-i-Sawai, a royal vessel owned by the Indian emperor Aurangzeb, then one of the world’s most powerful men. Onboard were not only the worshippers returning from their pilgrimage but tens of millions of dollars’ worth of gold and silver.

 

Is this where the 'they thought America was India' belief came from?

[RhopaloceraEFFECT 123]

This is interesting.. thank u for sharing .

[Gaga Lazuli 8,658]

9 minutes ago, bionic said:

Is this where the 'they thought America was India' belief came from?

That was Christopher Columbus, He though if he went west he could arrive to India faster.

[FfFfFfFF 58,058]

18 minutes ago, bionic said:

Is this where the 'they thought America was India' belief came from?

I don't think so! America was already discovered by Europeans at that point. The confusion stems the belief that there was a continious ocean between Europe/ Africa and the other side of Eurasia as they didn't expect a whole unexplored continent just there. This is esentially how they imagined it, minus Australia and other details.

[Nemo 4,410]

29 minutes ago, bionic said:

Is this where the 'they thought America was India' belief came from?

No. That was 200 years earlier, and it was only Columbus who thought that.

The general size of the Earth had been known since the time of Eratosthenes, ~200 BCE. Columbus, for reasons of his own, thought that it was smaller, such that a journey westward from Europe to the [East] "Indies" would be practical. Everyone else thought the ocean was too wide... which it would've been, if not for the existence of the New World, which neither side anticipated.

The idea that Columbus thought the world was round, while his contemporaries thought it flat, is a fiction invented by Washington Irving. (See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_History_of_the_Life_and_Voyages_of_Christopher_Columbus )