Pirates of the Mediterranean

This is a completed series of 4 x 45′ episodes. A further 4 are planned and developed, and are seeking pre-sales. Please enquire for details.

The Mediterranean Sea, the place where three continents meet. A turbulent water frontier. An ever changing landscape. A territory where the clash of civilizations, cultures and interests have been shaping for centuries the course of history. This is the sea of great naval powers, corsairs and pirates, the sea of trade, diplomacy and religion. From the 15th until the 19th century, the Mediterranean was ruled by piracy. This series fully explores the drama of the high seas with CGI, re-enactment and a mix of expert and archive materials.

Corsairs and pirates, Berbers, Greeks, Ottomans, French, English, Spaniards, Italians and Dutch raided commercial ships and terrorize the shores. They loot, kill, rape, and take prisoners to sell them as slaves in the slave markets, either working for themselves or for one of the great powers of the time, in a deadly rivalry of power and wealth.

It is an era of death and chaos; a time when the Great Powers and the Ottomans are fighting to establish their dominance in the Mediterranean. Infamous pirates became important political and military figures; legends who played a key role in shaping the history of the Mediterranean for over 400 years, and whose names still live on in songs and plays. Their stories are full of blood, wars, politics, love, betrayal, glory and humiliation: explore the largely unknown history of Europe.

The episodes include: The White Sea | Fire in the Cyclades | Barbarossa: The Ottomans’ Great Invasion | Lambros Katsonis: The Revolutionary Pirate

The style is achieved through the use of current footage, 3D graphics and dramatisations together with interviews with experts, medieval engravings, artefacts and documents.

Episode breakdown –

The White Sea:

The 17th century is the Golden Age of Piracy. The White Sea, as it was called by the Ottomans who couldn’t control it, has become more dangerous than ever.

Day by day, more pirates and corsairs – of all religions and ethnicities – arrive in the archipelago. They ravage the coasts, seizing people and goods. In vain, islanders try to protect themselves from the menace – through walled towns, observatories, hidden houses and secret hideouts. It is a period of terror.

A leading figure is the French pirate Hugues de Creveliers, a nobleman from Provence, who abandoned his wealth and a quiet life to seek adventure and glory in the Aegean. He established a mighty Company of pirates, attracting all the notorious pirates and corsairs of his era. They taxed the islanders, enslaving or taking hostage those who resisted.

A member of this Company was the ferocious Greek pirate Michalis Maniatis. During an attack in Ikaria, he kidnapped a seven-year-old boy, who later on sealed the fate of an entire island, Ikaria. Ottoman pirates did the same, abducting a boy from a Naxos beach, who, having himself become a pirate, was appointed as a high-ranking Ottoman official. Creveliers himself seized Adam, who years later was the one who took his life.

In the White Sea, people’s fates got sealed with salt and blood.

Pirates in the Cyclades:

From the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean, the 17th century is regarded as the golden age of piracy.

The Eastern Mediterranean is ablaze due to the long-lasting Venetian-Ottoman wars, leaving the sea-ways unguarded. Pirates and corsairs of all nationalities seize the opportunity provided.

Greeks, British, French, Italians, Dutch, Berbers and Ottomans find an ideal hideout in the Cycladic islands, in the heart of the Aegean. Coming from all corners of the Mediterranean, their routes converge on Milos island, which becomes the centre of piracy. This is where they over-winter, distribute their booty, sell slaves at the slave markets, get married and confess their sins to the island’s priests. Travellers of the time speak of “a debauched morality”. The island’s economy booms to such an extent that the French, Dutch and British establish consulates there.

Three of the greatest pirates will operate in the Cyclades, leaving an indelible mark on the Aegean: Ioannis Kapsis who conquers Milos and crowns himself as its king, Giovanni de lo Cavo who liberates Anafi and guarantees the safety of its inhabitants, and Stathis Romanos Manetas whose dramatic story was immortalized in song, keeping his memory alive to this day.

Barbarossa: The Ottomans’ Great Invasion:

Barbarossa. One name, two men. Two 16^th century brothers from the island of Lesbos, successively pirates, corsairs, rulers of Algiers, saviours of the Muslims of Andalucia, and nightmare of the Christian populations throughout the Mediterranean – effectively purged from sea and land

When Oruç falls to a Spaniards’ sword, Hizir swears revenge, shedding the blood of “infidels” in an endless Holy War against the West. The Sultan appoints him the first Admiral of the Ottoman Fleet; Barbarossa establishes absolute dominion of the Empire over the Mediterranean and the Aegean Archipelago. The Ottomans’ great invasion of the sea is now a fact.

Lambros Katsonis: The Revolutionary Pirate

Lambros Katsonis will never return to his beloved Crimea. He will be murdered en-route from St. Petersburg. The circumstances of his death remain murky and unclear to this day. The same applies to his life and deeds.

Russian and Greek historians are still trying to piece together the puzzle of this enigmatic personality, one of the most important actors in the Mediterranean and Aegean during the second half of the 18th century.

Coming from a poor Greek provincial town, he became a Russian naval officer; then, a notorious corsair in the Mediterranean and after that, a ruthless and deadly pirate. Nevertheless, he ended up a Tsarist nobleman and recipient of the Order of St. George.

His turbulent life, full of daring exploits shrouded in the mists of legend, exhibits an unlikely mix of qualities – of naval strategist, pirate, and revolutionary; someone who had already declared his own war against the Ottoman Empire, almost 30 years before the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence.