متى نشأة أسطورة اللحية السوداء ؟
Since the end of this so-called golden age of piracy, Teach and his exploits have become the stuff of lore, inspiring books, films and even amusement park rides. Much of what is known about him can be sourced to Charles Johnson's "A General Historie of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates", published in Britain in 1724. A recognised authority on the pirates of his time, Johnson's descriptions of such figures as Anne Bonny and Mary Read were for years required reading for those interested in the subject. Readers were titillated by his stories and a second edition was quickly published, though author Angus Konstam suspects that Johnson's entry on Blackbeard was "coloured a little to make a more sensational story." "A General Historie", though, is generally considered to be a reliable source. Johnson may have been an assumed alias. As Johnson's accounts have been corroborated in personal and official dispatches, Lee (1974) considers that whoever he was, he had some access to official correspondence. Konstam speculates further, suggesting that Johnson may have been the English playwright Charles Johnson, the British publisher Charles Rivington, or the writer Daniel Defoe. In his 1951 work "The Great Days of Piracy", author George Woodbury wrote that Johnson is "obviously a pseudonym", continuing "one cannot help suspecting that he may have been a pirate himself."
Despite his infamy, Teach was not the most successful of pirates. Henry Every retired a rich man, and Bartholomew Roberts took an estimated five times the amount Teach stole. Treasure hunters have long busied themselves searching for any trace of his rumoured hoard of gold and silver, but nothing found in the numerous sites explored along the east coast of the US has ever been connected to him. Some tales suggest that pirates often killed a prisoner on the spot where they buried their loot, and Teach is no exception in these stories, but that no finds have come to light is not exceptional; buried pirate treasure is often considered a modern myth for which almost no supporting evidence exists. The available records include nothing to suggest that the burial of treasure was a common practice, except in the imaginations of the writers of fictional accounts such as "Treasure Island". Such hoards would necessitate a wealthy owner, and their supposed existence ignores the command structure of a pirate vessel, in which the crew served for a share of the profit. The only pirate ever known to bury treasure was William Kidd; the only treasure so far recovered from Teach's exploits is that taken from the wreckage of what is presumed to be the "Queen Anne's Revenge", which was found in 1996. As of 2009 more than 250,000 artefacts had been recovered. A selection is on public display at the North Carolina Maritime Museum.
1724