Buried treasure is an important part of the popular beliefs surrounding pirates. According to popular conception, pirates often buried their stolen fortunes in remote places, intending to return for them later (often with the use of treasure maps). Look up pirate and piracy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Map created by Robert Lewis Stevenson in Treasure Island A treasure map is a common device used in fictional stories. ...

Pirates burying their treasures

In reality, the only pirate known to have done this was William Kidd, who is believed to have buried at least some of his wealth on Long Island before sailing into New York. Kidd had originally been commissioned as a privateer for England, but his behaviour had strayed into outright piracy, and he hoped that his treasure could serve as a bargaining chip in negotiations to avoid punishment. His bid was unsuccessful, however, and Kidd was hanged as a pirate. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1840x2888, 1355 KB) Summary Howard Pyle illustration of pirates burying treasure, from Howard Pyles Book of Pirates. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1840x2888, 1355 KB) Summary Howard Pyle illustration of pirates burying treasure, from Howard Pyles Book of Pirates. ... Howard Pyles painting of Kidd and his ship, the Adventure Galley, in a New York City harbor. ... Mercator projection of Long Island Long Island is an island in New York, USA. It has an area of 1,377 square miles (3567 km²) and a population of 7. ... Official language(s) English de facto Capital Albany Largest city New York City Area  Ranked 27th  - Total 54,520 sq mi (141,205 km²)  - Width 285 miles (455 km)  - Length 330 miles (530 km)  - % water 13. ... A privateer was a private ship (or its captain) authorized by a countrys government to attack and seize cargo from another countrys ships. ... Motto: (French for God and my right) Anthem: Multiple unofficial anthems Capital London Largest city London Official language(s) English Government Constitutional monarchy  - Queen Queen Elizabeth II  - Prime Minister Tony Blair MP Unification    - by Athelstan AD927  Area    - Total 130,395 km² (1st in UK)   50,346 sq mi   - Water (%) Population...

Buried treasure probably entered the public imagination with the publication of works such as The Gold Bug by Edgar Allan Poe and Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. Poe's work directly focuses on Kidd's treasure, and it is presumed that Stevenson was also thinking of Kidd when he wrote of buried treasure. The Gold Bug is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe. ... Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American poet, short story writer, editor, critic and one of the leaders of the American Romantic Movement. ... Treasure Island. ... Robert Louis Stevenson Robert Louis (Balfour) Stevenson (November 13, 1850 – December 3, 1894), was a Scottish novelist, poet, and travel writer, a leading representative of Neo-romanticism in English literature. ...

However, there are a number of reports of supposed buried pirate treasure that surfaced much earlier than these works, which indicates that at least the meme was around for more than a century before those stories were published. For example, some underground passages and structures on Oak Island (in Nova Scotia) have been excavated extensively since 1795 in the belief that one or more pirate captains had stashed large amounts of loot there. These excavations were said to have been prompted by still older legends of buried pirate treasure in the area. While it is clear that someone went to an extraordinary amount of trouble to bury something there it seems two centuries of excavation have destroyed any hope of determining the veracity of the original claims that pirates were responsible Oak Island, Nova Scotia. ...

See also

• Treasure
• Oak Island