Cilician pirates

Cilician pirates dominated the Mediterranean Sea from the 2nd century BC until their speedy suppression by Pompey in 67-66 BC. Although there were notorious pirate strongholds in Cilicia, Cilician had long been a generic term for pirates.

 

The next major infestation of and danger from pirates came from Cilicia, located between present-day Syria and Armenia. Since the pirates supplied much needed slaves, many Roman ports welcomed the Cilicians and their plunder. The demand for slaves became so great that small piratical bands began to work together to supply captives of all ages and sexes. Finally, the towns from which these citizens were taken offered to pay the pirates to protect against such raids. The Cilicians often accepted the money, but didn’t always cease their attacks. 

Tarkondimotos was a feared Cilician pirate before being made dynast by Pompey and crowned king by Marc Antony in 39 BC (hence the added name of Philantonius). He died in the sea battle of Actium.

Ancient Galleys

Egyptian Galley 1600 B.C. 

Mediterranean pirates sailed in galleys of various sizes with sleek, narrow hulls. (Galleys would continue to be used in these waters through the 1700s.) Although such a vessel often had a single sail, her primary means of propulsion came from oars. This meant men were needed to row, thus raids on villages provided slaves to do this job. The more warlike galleys of the Ancient Greeks and Romans – triremes – had long battering rams attached to the bows and up to 170 slaves, seated on three tiers of benches, who propelled the galleys through the water. Painted eyes adorned the prows so those aboard could “see” their prey.
 
Until about 800 B.C. a variety of ships were used in the Aegean sea. However, they had not yet developed the basic forms of the classical age. Most ships were more or less symmetrical in design (similar to Viking ships, though much more primitive and less seaworthy), and the standard fighting technique was to board the enemy vessel.

Greek War Galley

Then, around 800 B.C., the ram was developed as a ship-to-ship weapon. Suddenly, speed and maneuverability became prime concerns.

The result of this development was the penteconter ("50-oared"), a fast galley propelled by 50 oars-men, 25 to a side, working in a single row. This was a pure warship, not a merchant-man. The length of a big penteconter was probably somewhere around 38 meters, which is quite near to the maximum one can achieve with the available materials. The beam was approximately 4 meters, which is the minimum width for a ship with two rowers that have to work abreast and want good leverage for the oars. I have not found a tonnage for this ships. The top speed was estimated at 9.5 knots. A smaller version, the triaconter ("30-oared"), was also in use, with few differences except for the length of the ship.

Penteconter

The next important development is the bireme). Approximately around 700 B.C. somebody had the idea to use an outrigger. This was added to the open penteconter, and allowed two rows of oars. The lower row worked just as in the penteconter: The rowers were sitting towards the center of the ship, and the oars fulcrum was fixed on the rail. The rowers on the upper bench were sitting more to the outside (so they didn't interfere with the other row) and, to get a decent lever, their oars were fixed on the outrigger. Apparently the ship builders were willing to sacrifice some of the power of the lower row, because the beam of the bireme was only about 3 meters. Approximately 100 rowers were used, 25 per side in each of the two rows.

After getting the idea to use more rows of oars-men, the trireme was only a small step. According to Thukydides, the first triremes were build around 650 B.C. Around 500 B.C. the trireme was the standard heavy warship for most Greek city states.

For the trireme the outrigger was a more integral part of the ship then for the older bireme. It basically was a wide rowing frame, sitting on the still very narrow hull. Now the two upper rows of oars were fixed to the outrigger, the lower one passed through the side of the hull proper. The ship also had a (partial) fighting deck above the rowers (later versions probably had a full deck).

The length of a trireme has been given as 35 meters, the beam as 3.5 meters (due to the outrigger the dimensions could be smaller than for the penteconter, and the ship could still pack more punch). The tonnage of the trireme has been estimated at approximately 40 metric tons (one third of which would be due to the 170 rowers). The top speed is usually estimated at 11.5 knots, although there are some speculations about ancient galleys actually entering the glide phase, which would defeat most of the wave resistance and allow speeds of up to 18 or 20 knots for very short bursts (wave resistance is the major factor in determining the top speed for a floating hull of a given length). There is convincing historical evidence that at least on one occasion a trireme with a crack crew managed to maintain 9 knots for 24 hours.

Now, the speed of the trireme is only 20 percent higher than for the penteconter, although it had three times as many rowers. This is due to the fact that the wave resistance is growing exponentially with the speed of the ship. However, a trireme has other advantages. It was much more maneuverable then the penteconter. It could accelerate from standstill to half speed in 8 seconds,
and to top speed in approximately 30 seconds.

An interesting point is that the Greek trireme with 170 rowers was manned by only 14 to 20 marines. It had to rely on the ram - boarding maneuvers were seldom performed. The trireme was probably the most formidable ship ever designed for fighting with a ram. However, it had a number of drawbacks. It required a carefully trained and large crew. A single rower who couldn't maintain the stroke could cripple the ship for minutes. Therefore, only free men were used on triremes. If, in times of an emergency, slaves had to be used, they were freed before the combat. A whip or lash was not used (and wouldn't have worked).

Ancient Greek Trireme

One answer to the high cost and complexity was a new type of bireme (Type 2). It was developed by taking the lower row out of a trireme and shrinking the beam accordingly. With a length of 20 to 25 meters, and a beam of only 2.5 meters, the four rowers were working all abreast, and all oars would have their fulcrums on the outrigger. This bireme was smaller than the type 1 bireme described above, but it was much meaner, packing more power into a smaller, and faster ship.

These new biremes were cheaper than the trireme, and required only about 100 rowers. It was also easier to train the crew to row with only two rows of oars.

A completely different approach lead to the quadrireme, quinquereme and even larger ships. Now more people were used to move one oar, while the basic setup of a bireme or trireme was kept. This made the effort of a single rower less important. Also, these bigger ships could carry more marines (the Romans, who mostly used quinqueremes, packed 120 marines on the ships).  They also made more stable platforms for catapults.

During the time of the Hellenistic diadochs this development was carried to the extreme, with large catamarans carrying up to 4000 rowers and lots of catapults. These ships proved to be quite effective for a time, but they had significant drawbacks. First, they were extremely expensive. Secondly, they were too slow, and hence of little strategic impact (you have to get your ships to the enemy before you can fight him). Also, the ancient seamen developed a wolf-pack tactic for the smaller ships, so that the catapults of the giants were not able to stop all of them from getting in a ram attack or a fire bomb on the giant ship - which sank a giant just as easy as a smaller ship. The battle of Actium, where Octavian's naval commander Aggrippa defeated the fleet of Antonius and Cleopatra, is an excellent (if late) example of this. Octavian and Cleopatra had about 220 ships, most of which were quinqueremes or larger, Aggrippa employed Liburnes, fast galleys with only one to three rows of oars.

At the same time the Diadochs fought for control of the eastern Mediterreanen, the Romans developed another approach to naval warfare during the Punic wars. They were not very capable seaman, but used large all-purpose warships (Quinqueremes are often quoted) and developed very effective boarding tactics (using a boarding bridge (the "corvus"), grapples, and similar devices).  If this would have been effective for a long time is questionable. However, Rome fought few naval battles. After the empire was supreme in the Mediterranean, few warships were needed, and they were mostly relegated to fighting pirates.

 
Reposted From Pirates and Pirvateers

When Julius Caesar Was Kidnapped By Pirates, He Demanded They Increase His Ransom

In 75 BCE, 25-year-old Julius Caesar was sailing the Aegean Sea when he was kidnapped by Cilician pirates. According to Plutarch, when the pirates asked for a ransom of 20 talents of silver (approximately 620 kg of silver, or $600,000 in today's silver values), Caesar laughed at their faces. They didn't know who they had captured, he said, and demanded that they ask for 50 (1550 kg of silver), because 20 talents was simply not enough.
More Money, More Problems

The pirates, of course, agreed, and Caesar sent some of his associates off to gather the silver, a task that took 38 days. Now nearly alone with the pirates—only two servants and a friend remained with him—Caesar refused to cower. Instead, he treated the pirates as if they were his subordinates. He even went so far as to demand they not talk whenever he decided to sleep. He spent most of his time with them composing and reciting poetry and writing speeches. He would then recite the works to the pirates. Caesar also played various games with the pirates and participated in their exercises, generally acting as if he wasn’t a prisoner, but rather, their leader. The pirates quickly grew to respect and like him and allowed him the freedom to more or less do as he pleased on their island and ships.

While Caesar was friendly with the pirates, he didn’t appreciate being held captive. He told the pirates that, after his ransom was paid, he would hunt them down and have them crucified. Once he was freed, he made good on that promise: Despite the fact that he was a private citizen, Caesar managed to quickly raise a small fleet which he took back to the island where he had been held captive. Apparently the pirates hadn’t taken his threats seriously, because they were still there when he arrived. He captured them and took back his 50 talents of silver, along with all their possessions.

He next delivered the pirates to the authorities at the prison at Pergamon and then traveled to meet the proconsul of Asia, Marcus Junius, to petition to have the pirates executed. The proconsul refused: He wanted to sell the pirates as slaves and take the spoils for himself. Undeterred, Caesar traveled back to Pergamon where the Cilician pirates were being held and ordered that they be crucified. Before they went through that ordeal, however, Caesar showed some leniency—he cut their throats.

Cilician Pirates

Pirates were the scourge of the ancient Mediterranean and the Lycian coast justly gained the reputation as the "Pirate Coast".  This coast is dotted with many strategically placed coves and islands where the sea-raiders would hide themselves and pounce upon the many heavily-laden merchant ships sailing by.  Numerous efforts were continually necessary to clean up the coast from as early as 1194 BC until it was cleared in the 19th century.  

The most famous pirates of the ancient world were the Cilician pirates, based on what is now the southeast coast of Turkey. The Cilicians managed to control much of the eastern Mediterranean during the first century BC, a time when the Roman republic was wracked by civil war.

The main trade of the pirates was slavery. Roman merchants bought the most slaves. Roman land owners held large plantations worked by slaves. Sicily was notorious for its slave plantations owned by Romans. 

By the 1st century BC, what began as a nuisance became a plague on the Mediterranean commerce. The Cilician pirates roamed across the entire Mediterranean, and began to attack the towns of Italy itself. In fact, even Ostia was plundered.

Eventually, Rome took action. In 75 BC, P. Servilius Isauricus led a campaign over land against the pirate bases in Cilicia and against their allies the Isauri. But this was only a temporary relief.

Finally, after heated debate, Pompey was granted extraordinary powers to eliminate the Cilician pirates. Pompey divided the Mediterranean into thirteen districts, to each of which he assigned a fleet and a commander. Pompey then swept through the western Mediterranean with his own powerful fleet, driving the pirates out or into the paths of his other commanders. By keeping vigilance over all the sea at the same time (and at great cost), there was nowhere to run or hide. Those Cilician pirates that did escape fled to the eastern Mediterranean. Pompey completed this first part of his campaign in 40 days.

Pompey then turned to the eastern Mediterranean. He gave mild terms to those pirates who surrendered to him personally, as opposed to his other commanders. Some pirates surrendered their ships, their families and themselves up to Pompey. From these, he learned about where others were hiding. Many pirates retreated to their strongholds of Asia Minor, where they gathered and waited for Pompey to attack them. At Coracesium Pompey won a decisive victory and blockaded the town. The Cilician pirates surrendered all their harbors and fortified islands. The Romans took the wealth the pirates had collected, and released many of their prisoners, whom the pirates intended to ransom; other prisoners were sold into slavery. Strabo writes that Pompey destroyed 1300 pirate vessels of all sizes.

Pompey spared numerous Cilician pirates who had been taken prisoner, realizing that many had been driven to such recourse by desperation. Those who surrendered were settled in various parts of the southern coast of Asia Minor, where the population was sparse. Settlements were created at Mallus, Adana, and Epiphaneia in Cilicia. Many were settled at Soli, which was thereafter called Pompeiopolis.

The eastern campaign lasted 49 days. In total, Pompey's campaign removed the Cilician pirates, who had held a stranglehold on Mediterranean commerce and threatened Rome with famine, in a mere 89 days, the summer of 66 BC.

Ancient Pirates: Sea Peoples Defeat - "Medinet Habu Temple"

During the reign of the Pharaoh Ramesses III (1194-1163 BCE) the Sea Peoples attacked and destroyed the Egyptian trading center at Kadesh (in modern day Syria) and then again attempted an invasion of Egypt. 

 

Relief from the sanctuary of the Temple of Khonsu at Karnak depicting Ramesses III

They began their activities with quick raids along the coast (as they had done in the time of Ramesses II) before driving for the Delta. Ramesses III defeated them in 1180 BCE but they returned in force. Ramesses then set up ambushes along the coast and the Nile and made especially effective use of his archers, positioning them hidden along the shoreline to rain down arrows on the ships at his signal, once they were in range. Once the ships' complement was dead or drowning the ships were set afire with flaming arrows and the Sea Peoples were finally defeated off the city of Xois in 1178 BCE. 

Egyptian records, again, detail a glorious victory in which many of the Sea Peoples were slain and others taken captive and pressed into the Egyptian army and navy or sold as slaves.

After their defeat by Ramesses III the Sea Peoples vanish from history, the survivors of the battle perhaps being assimilated into Egyptian culture. No records indicate where they came from and there are no accounts of them after 1178 BCE but, for almost one hundred years, they were the most feared sea raiders in the Mediterranean region and a constant challenge to the might and prosperity of Egypt.

Defeated Sea Peoples

Ancient Pirates: Sea Peoples Sea Battle wit the Eyptians - "Medinet Habu Temple"

 

 
The other famous relief at Medinet Habu regarding the Sea Peoples is of the sea battle. This scene is also shown in a disorganized mass, but as was mentioned earlier, was meant to represent chaos, again contradicting the Egyptians’ descriptions of the military success and organization of the Sea Peoples. The sea battle scene is valuable for its depictions of the Sea Peoples' ships and their armaments. 

The Egyptians and the Sea Peoples both used sails as their main means of naval locomotion. However, interestingly, the Sea Peoples' ships appear to have no oars, which could indicate new navigation techniques (Dothan 1982: 7).  Another interesting feature of the Sea Peoples' ships is that all the prows are carved in the shape of bird heads, which has caused many scholars to speculate an Aegean origin for these groups. Wachsmann (2000) speculates that the sea battle relief shows the battle in progression, from beginning to end.

Sea People's War Ship