privateer

She either became a privateer herself, taking to the Mediterranean Sea to attack Spanish holdings such as Gibraltar, or she licensed privateers to attack Spain in her name.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 2, 2024

At this year's race all 62 cars, including the many privateer entries, run on a sustainable fuel made from vineyard grape skin waste.

From BBC ● Jun. 12, 2023

His father, Jan Jansen, a Dutch privateer, was captured by one of the Moorish states in 1618.

From New York Times ● Dec. 3, 2019

It was here that the White Lion, a 160-ton English privateer ship, landed at what was then known as Point Comfort.

From The Guardian ● Aug. 14, 2019

“Best privateer that ever raked a Britisher with a broadside! You want to buy expectations from me?”

From "Carry On, Mr. Bowditch" by Jean Lee Latham

These are licenses for private parties, known as privateers, to capture prizes at sea.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 15, 2026

In theory, pirates plunder and pillage outside the law, while corsairs were privateers regulated by authorities.

From National Geographic ● Jan. 11, 2024

The privateers were sponsored by the state, and set a ransom of 500 Guineas for Capt Lambton who was sailing The Stephenson from Bristol to Newcastle at the time.

From BBC ● May 17, 2023

She theorizes that fake dollars could be passed to privateers trading on the black market.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 24, 2016

We passed other boats and ships of small draught, but all avoided challenge for fear of tampering with privateers.

From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves" by M.T. Anderson

By reviving prize law and privateering, the U.S. would enhance its leverage in the Strait of Hormuz.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 15, 2026

The Protestant queen wanted colonies that would act as an ideological counterweight to Spanish Catholicism in the Americas and provide a base of operations for privateering expeditions that would raid Spanish shipping.

From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022

While the practice known as privateering is archaic, the idea has come up in recent decades.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 3, 2022

By 1856, 42 nations agreed to the Declaration of Paris, which abolished privateering and formally turned pirates from accepted actors into international pariahs to be pursued by all the world’s major powers.

From Slate ● Jan. 2, 2014

In 1619, the first Africans arrived in the Virginia colony on a privateering ship.

From "Blood on the River" by Elisa Carbone