Pirate or Marathi admiral?

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Since today is International Talk Like A Pirate Day (y)aarr, I wanted to blog about Kanhoji Angre, an African–Indian who became the most powerful “pirate” of his era in the world:

Yaarrrrrr

Kanhoji … Angira[‘s] …operations off the west coast of India developed into what was probably the most successful piracy endeavor of the 17th or 18th century. [Link]

He was the first pirate who dared to extort money from Indian and British shipping. In 1712 he seized the armed yacht of the East India Company’s governor and held it for a sizeable ransom. Several years later he repelled the British … using specially built gunships. His success drew pirates from India and Europe and by the 1720’s his captains commanded hundreds of well-armed vessels. By 1722 his repeated humiliations of the Company led to their cessation of attempts to destroy Kanhoji. [Link]

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p>While Kanhoji is considered a pirate by the western world, he’s a national hero in India. The Indian Navy named a major naval base after him, and a memorial was due to be erected in his honor in Alibag. In the Indian narrative, he is “the great Admiral of Marathas,” Shivaji’s naval commander:

British historians have described Kanhoji Angre as a pirate, ignoring that he was appointed by the Maratha king. [Link]

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p>How much Angre was working for himself versus for the Marathas is a matter of some debate. It seems that he was allied with the King, but not consistently, and operated as a power center in his own right. One writer argues that he started as an independent, was appointed a naval admiral, then broke off, then came back in, but he continued to benefit personally from his actions rather than acting purely for the state. At the least, this made him a privateer, like Sir Francis Drake:

Whether someone was a pirate or not is a matter of interpretation. Sir Francis Drake was a prime example of this. To the English, he was a privateer and a hero. To the Spanish, anyone who attacked their ships was a pirate, and they treated him accordingly. The same was true of Kanhoji Angria… Both were national heroes. Both were also pirates.

Drake served in the Royal Navy, was a Member of Parliament, and a successful merchant. He circumnavigated the globe, received a knighthood, and fought against the Spanish Armada. He was also one of Queen Elizabeth I’s Sea Dogs, privateers who sometimes blurred the lines between legal privateering and illegal piracy. [Link]

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p>It’s funny that accusations of piracy come from the British East Indian company, itself one of history’s greatest drugs cartels. History is written by the victors.

Related posts: Desi Accented Pirate Talk

38 thoughts on “Pirate or Marathi admiral?”

  1. Kanhoji Angre was African -Indian !!!! Are you sure? And you are right, history is written by victors. Very unfair.

  2. Kanhoji Angre was African -Indian

    That’s the part that’s hardest to substantiate. I had heard it elsewhere too – there is an academic reference I read in school, but when it came time to blog all I could find on the web were references in passing.

  3. When I was in school, we read an intereting article (can’t recall the cite) that argued that the “real” difference between pirates and privateers was that pirates couldn’t enforce their contracts in any port, while an English privateer like Drake, while treated like a pirate by the Spanish, could enforce contracts in Britain. Thus, privateers could attract better surgeons and navigators, b/c they could more credibly commit to paying higher shares to specialists. The article then presented data showing higher death rates and higher rates of sinking on pirate ships than on privateers. Pretty interesting–has stuck with me. So, I wonder what the division of loot on Angre’s ships was–egalitarian suggests “pirate,” skills-based with large differentials suggests “privateer.”

  4. i have nothing to add on the topic, but i just can resist saying….

    ARRR! ARRRRRGH! HARDY HAR! YA MATIES! AAAAR!!!!

    i wonder if this guy counts as a divine creature from the FSM perspective?

  5. many u.s. founding fathers were “pirates” or invested in piracy (the technical term is “privateer”). so its not that strange…it was not really looked down upon to the same extent that it is today.

  8. forgot to add, that the identities “pirate” and “admiral” were not mutually exclusive in most of the seventeenth and 18th centuries. many “admirals” did both (in fact the East India company made a lot of money that way; i.e. by holding dutch or portuguese ships)

  10. That’s the part that’s hardest to substantiate. I had heard it elsewhere too – there is an academic reference I read in school, but when it came time to blog all I could find on the web were references in passing.

    5 minutes in books.google.com doesn’t smoke out a connection to africans aside from his family’s traditional conflicts with local siddi pirates and warlords. i invite other SM readers to clear up the man’s origins (if 10 people put 5 minutes in it will be cleared up quickly).

  12. Some official Alibag history. Along w/ borderline unPC language.

    Son-Kolis are strongly made and vary in colour from dark to brown. The younger women are healthy and fresh-looking, and some of them fair and handsome.

    As I mentioned in earlier YARRR post, Kanhoji’s legend looms large in parts of Mumbai and Alibag. Calling him pirate is a good way to get a beat-down.

    Brooklyn Brown, What did you look under? Marathi word for pirate is chacha (first cha hard).

  13. Shodan,

    sorry, I meant that I was fruitless in trying to generate funny marathi equivalents for common english pirate sayings, e.g. “shiver me timbers!”, “cast off, me hearteys!”, “walk the plank!”, etc..

    i suspect that your command over the language is much better than mine, so should you generate a few, please share! 😉

  15. I saw this interesting documentary on the History Channel about the first pirates..Mainly Captain Morgan (now known as the dude on the label of the spiced rum). The documentary narrated how these guys first worked for the British looting Spanish ships, which had made their gold in the Americas. the Brits encouraged and armed them and inturn they shared the loot with them, only later did things get sour, when the pirates turned against them that the Brits termed piracy illegal.

    Come down timeline, we have the West arming the Taliban to fight the Russians and then 9/11 and they are the bad guys 🙂 Its funny how history repeats itself but we dont seem to be learning a darn thing!!

  16. 15 · kannan on September 19, 2007 02:17 PM Come down timeline, we have the West arming the Taliban to fight the Russians and then 9/11 and they are the bad guys 🙂 Its funny how history repeats itself but we dont seem to be learning a darn thing!!

    Wait–what were we supposed to learn from your potted history? Never arm anyone?

  17. nice post.

    Today he would have a corporate structure and could call himself … Blackwater 😉

    haha. or CACI.

  18. The identification of him as African could be wrong too, it seems that he attacked the local Siddi population (who were powerful, but aligned with the Mughals):

    1706 – Attacks and defeats the Siddhi of Janjira [Wiki]
    The Siddis also conquered the Underi island on the entrance to the Mumbai harbor and strategically placed themselves to dominate the West coast of India. This gave complete freedom to raid and harrass the Maharatta territory as Shivaji rose to power. The Siddis were appointed by Awrangzeb to protect Moslems making the Haj to the Arab lands. The Siddis also routinely formed alliances with the British and the Portuguese to harrass the Hindus on the coast. Shivaji and his admiral Khanoji Angre contained the Siddi to his strong hold at Janjira by outflanking him but failed to overcome him.[Link]

    That would argue against the idea that he was a Siddi. I could have been confused because there were other Siddi admirals in that area. I have seen a few fragmentary identifications of Angre as “African” but no more than that.

  21. Interesting post, Ennis! You read about Kanhoji Angre in school? Really? He was not in any textbook I ever read in India. Your points on victor’s history, the true character of the East India Company, etc are well taken.

    But I did read about Kunhali Marakkar from Amar Chitra Katha history comics (not a textbook) – the Admiral of the Zamorin of Cochin’s fleet against the Portuguese. Indian Navy is now trying to commemorate him, too.

    Slightly off-topic, but do people know that ‘Indiaman’ refers to a ship? Does anyone know how the usage came about?

  22. You read about Kanhoji Angre in school?

    I read something about African admirals around Bombay, I could have been confused. However, when I saw sites referring to Angre as an African muslim, I saw it as confirmation. It could be wrong, there were prominent Siddi admirals / “pirates” and the British may have conflated them with Angre.

  26. 15 men on a dead man’s trunk! Yo ho ho and a cup of chai!! Shiver me timbers matey!

    I like this post, interesting. I like the thought of him being a pirate and he might have strayed away from the Indian navy. The fact that they label him pirate shows what a headache he was to the evil empire!!

  27. He wasn’t African. His main rivals were the African-Indian Siddi kings at Janjira. Those are the Indian African admirals you might have read about. The african siddis were muslim, while the Angres were very much hindu. (One of his descendants set up a number of temples in the area). And I have no idea where the websites you linked to got the idea that he was African.

    My understanding is that Angre was neither a privateer, nor was he an `admiral of the Maratha Navy’, in the modern sense of the word. (He did not take orders from the king). Chieftain would probably be a more appropriate word – like the Scindias of Gwalior, the Holkars of Indore and Gaekwars of Baroda, the Angres were rulers in their own right, and just another one of highly influential maratha family loosely confederated into the Maratha empire. In addition to controlling the seas, the Angres also ruled stretches of territory along the western coast.

    At various times, Angre and his descendants opposed the rest of the maratha confederation, and at these times, it was the Siddis who were allied with the Marathas.

  28. To abey alibag se aaya kya?

    There are multiple sources that refer to Angria has having been an Admiral or Sarkhel:

    The daring exploits of Kanhoji Angria (sometimes spelled Conajee Angria or Kanhoji Angre) brought him to the attention of the Peshwa, who appointed Angria Admiral of the Maratha fleet in 1698. In this capacity he protected India from interlopers. Being an admiral wasn’t enough, though. He wanted to be a ruler in his own right. In 1704, after breaking away from the Peshwa, he attacked British ships belonging to the East India Company and was described as a “Rebel Independent of the Rajah Shivaji.” (R.N. Saletore, Indian Pirates from the Earliest Times to the Present Day, 1978) His superiors sent an army against him to curb his desire for independence, but he defeated them. In the ensuing negotiations, he acknowledged Satara as his superior and he became the commander of Satara’s fleet. In spite of negotiated treaties, which he sometimes initiated, he continually harassed English and Portuguese merchant ships over a period of twenty-five years. In time he came to control almost the entire west coast of India. His continued attacks led them to conclude he was a pirate. [Citation]

    How well he took orders from the king is a different matter, but it seems that he was at least nominally an admiral at various points.

    There are a few sources that refer to him as having been African, but they simply state it, without any explanation or detail, which is why I have crossed it out in the post.

  29. There were also a bunch of black Africans (as opposed to Arab North Africans) who fought for Kittur Rani Chennamma in Karnataka. The great lady warrior provided these former slaves with a homeland in Karnataka and they decided to support her out of loyalty.

  30. hey i just read that the harrapan culture was established by ethiopian who were then driven down south by the aryans…funny thing i read it just yesterday and was thinking about how it could be possible and today this post…will try to find the website

  31. found it!! well, it says the ethiopians are colonist from the harappan civilisation…thats even more confusing

  32. Chieftain would probably be a more appropriate word – like the Scindias of Gwalior, the Holkars of Indore and Gaekwars of Baroda, the Angres were rulers in their own right, and just another one of highly influential maratha family loosely confederated into the Maratha empire. In addition to controlling the seas, the Angres also ruled stretches of territory along the western coast.

    The Maratha Empire conisted of many independent rulers and satraps who lend their armies to the Peshwa (Prime Minister).

    Angre are most like to be a part of Agri Samaj or Koli Samaj communities of maharashtra.

  33. kittur rani’s territory was contiguous with the regions of southern maharashrtra and konkan that angre and the siddis operated. there are a number of villages in this region that lies near the intersection of modern day goa, karnataka, and maharashtra which are siddi. as a abd kid i once wondered what rastafarians were doing at a bustop in a remote corner of karnataka. not all are muslim however, many are christian, and some are even hindu. in my understanding the terms siddi and habshi are not equivalent. a habshi was an abyssinian, often a nobleman or at least a capable mercenary. siddis were probably not from the horn of africa, and may have been bonded servants of some sort. there are pockets of them up and down the west coast of india and pakistan, but this cluster near goa is the most noted. there are local legends about them being the descendants of shipwrecked africans, but that seems a simple reduction of what was likely the outcome of a complex arabian sea economy of material, labour, ect. in the 16th century

  35. i … i have a confession to make: i read the title of this post as Paratha or Mithai admiral. it was still a good post, even if it didn’t quite meet my expectations.

  36. Hello everybody. Khnoji Angre – hero of this topic was sarkhel( Admirel) maratha navy. British were lost many wars against him. If you really want to know the history pl. read book – Khanoji Angre written by Manohar Malgaonkar of India. It is obvious that Bristis want to project Great Khanoji as pirate as they could not win a single war against him for more that 37 years.

  37. Kanhoji Angree was maratha naval chief(known as sarkhel) during that time.He was appointed as sarkhel by Chattrapati Shahu Maharaj of Satara(son of Sambhaji and grandson of Shivaji).According to him British,Portugese or any other European power during that time should pay tax to him if they wanted to take their ships along sea near Konkan coast as it belonged to Marartha Kingdom.This was not at all wrong because British and Portugese themselves use to collect such taxes from ships which would pass through their waters.Especially British(East India Company)in Bombay were not ready to pay such taxes and hence their ships were captured and taken away by his soldiers.He never use to seize any ship which had shown any documents which were proof that they had paid proper tax.British therefore would always try to teach him lesson but did not sucseed even a single time and later tried to declare him as pirate.He was once help by Bajirao Peshwa of Chattrapati Shahu Maharaj to win a war against combine forces of British ,Portugese and Siddhis.Even today there his statue at one of docks in Mumbai.To show respect for such great naval warrior against whom European were not even able to win a single(major battle) ,The Indian navy has named a ship after him as INS Angree.There is nice book written in English which has been translated to Marathi by P.L.Deshpande known as Kanhoji Angree.If you want to know more about this great man please read this book. Thank you

  38. Not sure if this post is too old for me to comment, but here goes:

    Many years ago I reviewed Manohar Malgonkar’s book “Seahawk”, but the web site on which the review was posted is now defunct.

    “Seahawk” is quite well researched, and it provides a good background on Kanhoji Angre’s family and origins based partly on Malgonkar’s interviews with Angre’s descendants. It also provides a detailed account of Kanhoji Angre’s relationship with successive Maratha kings. Suffice it to say that Kanhoji Angre was not a pirate by any definition, not even by the contemporary definition used by the British. Western accounts that mention Angre are based either on inaccurate information (e.g., “African Muslim”), or are downright defamatory (e.g., “dastardly pirate”).

    I will try to find my review of the book and provide a pointer to it.

    By the way, the title of the post is a little inaccurate: “Marathi” is not the term used for the empire, only for the language. The word you’re looking for is “Maratha”, I believe.