Ancient Mediterranean piracy
The roots of the word "piracy" come from the ancient Greek πειράομαι, or peiráomai, meaning "attempt" (i.e., of something illegal for personal gain).
"[8] The rocky coast that had been unsuitable for agriculture was well suited to piracy, outfitted with hidden inlets that allowed quick access points to trade routes.
According to writer Cindy Vallar, "pirate enclaves grew up along rocky shores that provided shelter and kept them hidden from view until it was too late for their victims to escape.
"[9] Because of early maritime raiders' roots in land raiding, they were known to attack ships and coastal towns and to venture further inland.
[citation needed] Piracy offered a lucrative career, a chance for those who were interested to try to change their lives and better their livelihood a hundredfold in a short time.
[citation needed] The Amarna letters, a series of 362 clay correspondence tablets from the king of Babylon to Pharaoh Amenhotep III or his son Akhenaten written around 1350 BCE, tell of sea raiders beginning not just to plunder ships but also to capture Babylonian towns.
The tablets mention two groups of pirates, the Lukka (modern Turkey) and the Sherden, raising both security concerns and economic disruption.
"[15] The diverse group known collectively as the "Sea Peoples", a term used by Ramses III on his mortuary temple at Medinet Habu as well as on numerous obelisks and stelae, may have also been pirates.
Greek sources describe this navy as the product of the legendary king Minos, and suggest "it is likely he cleared the sea of piracy as far as he was able, to improve his revenues.
For when that king had asked the man what he meant by keeping hostile possession of the sea, he answered with bold pride, "What do thou meanest by seizing the whole earth?
Because I do it with a petty ship, I am called a robber, whilst thou who dost it with a great fleet art styled emperor.
"[22]After Alexander's death and during the subsequent wars among his successors,[26] both independent crews of brigands and state hired mercenaries were sources of piracy.
[28] By the time Rhodes had become the dominant naval power of the Aegean, part of the function of the League of the Islanders (which was founded by Antigonus I Monophthalmus to be an allied force in the Wars of the Diadochi) was to deflect pirates from its member states.
Rhodes was the central trading area of the Mediterranean at this time, with five harbors that could be accessed from all wind directions, at a fairly even distance from most major Hellenistic powers, and it was imperative for their economy that the waters around them be seen by traders as safe from pirates.
"[31] It was a small, fast ship built to serve the purpose of quickly emerging from or retreating to hidden inlets to attack heavier vessels.
His description of Teuta, queen of the Illyrians states, reads: "Her first measure was to grant letters of marque to privateers, authorising them to plunder all whom they fell in with.
"[22] Rome's attention was on land-based conquests, and they did not initially seek to become the naval police that Rhodes (and previously Athens) had been for the Greek islands.
However, when Illyrian forces attacked a convoy of ships with grain intended for the military, the Roman Senate decided to send two envoys to Queen Teuta, who promptly had one killed.
