But an early reference to Muslim corsairs flying a skull symbol, in the context of a 1625 slave raid on Cornwall, explicitly refers to the symbols being shown on a green flag. It possibly originated among the Barbary pirates of the period, which would connect the black colour of the Jolly Roger to the Muslim Black Standard (black flag). The first recorded uses of the skull-and-crossbones symbol on naval flags date to the 17th century. Design įurther information: Skull and crossbones (military) and TotenkopfĪlthough it, most likely, was not called "Jolly Roger", usage of flag containing skull and crossbones go as early as 1588, in Basel's dance of death, Hulderich Frölich. This Flag they called Old Roger, and us'd to say, They would live and die under it. It had in it the Portraiture of Death, with an Hour-Glass in one Hand, and a Dart in the other, striking into a Heart, and three Drops of Blood delineated as falling from it. Their black Flag, under which they had committed abundance of Pyracies and Murders, was affix'd to one Corner of the Gallows. Some of them delivered what they had to say in writing, and most of them said something at the Place of Execution, advising all People, young ones especially, to take warning by their unhappy Fate, and to avoid the crimes that brought them to it. This Day, 26 of the Pirates taken by his Majesty Ship the Greyhound, Captain Solgard, were executed here. Īnother early reference to "Old Roger" is found in a news report in the Weekly Journal or British Gazetteer (London, Saturday, OctoIssue LVII, p. 2, col. This is sometimes attributed to red blood, symbolizing violent pirates, ready to kill. It is sometimes claimed that the term derives from "Joli Rouge" ("Pretty Red") in reference to a red flag used by French privateers.
This description closely resembles the flags of a number of Golden Age pirates. Richard Hawkins, who was captured by pirates in 1724, reported that the pirates had a black flag bearing the figure of a skeleton stabbing a heart with a spear, which they named "Jolly Roger". Neither Spriggs' nor Roberts' Jolly Roger consisted of a skull and crossbones. While Spriggs and Roberts used the same name for their flags, their flag designs were very different, suggesting that already "Jolly Roger" was a generic term for black pirate flags rather than a name for any single specific design. Johnson specifically cites two pirates as having named their flag "Jolly Roger": Bartholomew Roberts in June 1721 and Francis Spriggs in December 1723. Use of the term Jolly Roger in reference to pirate flags goes back to at least Charles Johnson's A General History of the Pyrates, published in Britain in 1724. It became the most commonly used pirate flag during the 1720s, although other designs were also in use. The flag most commonly identified as the Jolly Roger today – the skull and crossbones symbol on a black flag – was used during the 1710s by a number of pirate captains, including Black Sam Bellamy, Edward England, and John Taylor.
Jolly Roger is the traditional English name for the flags flown to identify a pirate ship preceding or during an attack, during the early 18th century (the latter part of the Golden Age of Piracy). The pirate captain Jean Thomas Dulaien would wait for the enemy to fire three or more cannon shots after raising the red flag before giving the order to attack with no quarter given. Followed by warning shots, if the enemy did not strike their own flag to signal surrender, the red flag (or bloody flag as it is known) was raised, signaling that the target's cargo/valuables will be taken by force and that " no quarter" will be given if the enemy ship continued to refuse surrender. After closing in on a target ship, the black flag would be raised, signaling that " quarter" will be given if the target crew surrendered their cargo/valuables without a fight. The black flag was part of a flag signal combo, together with a plain red flag. Prior to the advent and popularization of the "Jolly Roger" we know today, western pirates flew a simple black flag, initially devoid of design.
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