Turns out, it wasn’t just in the movies.

Pirate articles, or articles of agreement, were a code of conduct for governing ships of pirates, notably between the 17th and 18th centuries, during the so-called “Golden Age of Piracy”. The typical pirate crew was an unorthodox mixture of former sailors, escaped convicts, disillusioned men, and possibly former or escaped slaves, among others, looking for wealth at any cost; once aboard a seafaring vessel, the group would draw-up their own ship- and crew-specific code (or articles)…