The Sea dogs as the builders of the international colonialist network

Abstract

The given article analyses the impact of the Elizabethan seafarers on the development of the early international communication networks connecting separately shaped world zones of the so-called agrarian civilizations. The research is concentrated on the complex role of piratical and privateering activities in the process of linking those zones together, or on the question how such ventures stimulated new colonization, new exchanges and new discoveries. At the same time it has been argued why the late sixteenth century piracy and privateering were features of not only distinctive group of seafarers but of the whole group of English seamen. Among those piratical adventurers selected for the current examination are as follows: John Hawkins, Martin Frobisher, John Oxenham, Francis Drake, Humphrey Gilbert, Walter Raleigh, Thomas Cavendish and Richard Grenville. Each of them is well known for his achievements. John Hawkins made first attempts of the English slave trade across the Atlantic Ocean, Martin Frobisher established the earliest contacts of the Europeans and the Esquimaux, John Oxenham became the first Englishman who reached the Pacific Ocean, Francis Drake and John Cavendish conducted the circumnavigations with the huge profits for their shareholders, Humphrey Gilbert founded the first English settlement at Newfoundland, while Walter Ralegh and Richard Grenville actively participated in the earliest colonization of Virginia territory. However its destructive role, seaborne robbery in some cases provided motivation, remuneration and seamen’s preparation for these early modern discoveries and explorations eventually aimed at linking different world zones together into one international colonialist network.