Zymen Danseker

Siemen Danziger (c. 1579 – c. 1615), better known by his anglicized names Zymen Danseker and Simon de Danser, was a 17th-century Dutch privateer and Barbary corsair based in Ottoman Algeria.

Danseker and the English pirate John Ward were the two most prominent renegades operating in the Barbary coast during the early 17th century.

Both were said to command squadrons in Algiers and Tunis that were equal to their European counterparts, and, as allies, together represented a formidable naval power (much as had Aruj and Hayreddin Barbarossa in the previous century).

Both men are featured prominently in Kitab al-Munis fi Akhbar Ifriqiya wa Tunis written by Tunisian writer and historian Ibn Abi Dinar [fr].

Often bringing Spanish prizes and prisoners to Algiers, due to his exploits he became known under the names Simon Re'is, Deli-Reis (Captain Crazy) and Deli Kapitan among the people on the Barbary coast and the Turks.

He was also the first to lead the Algiers through the Straits of Gibraltar, the farthest distance they had ever successfully navigated, and traveled as far as Iceland, which would later be attacked by Barbary corsairs in 1616.

In 1609, while taking a Spanish galleon off Valencia, Danziger sent a message to Henri IV and the French court through the Jesuit priests on board.