Book Review of: Mare Amaro. I corsari barbareschi sull’orizzonte italiano del Cinquecento

by James W. Nelson Novoa

The historical study of piracy in the Mediterranean in the early modern period, while certainly not inexistent, has not always been given the consideration which it most certainly deserves. The recent book by Gennaro Varriale (Mare Amaro. I corsari barbareschi sull’orizzonte italiano del Cinquecento, Società editrice Dante Alighieri, Rome, 2023, pp. 104, ISBN 9788853434449, €15,00) addresses the theme from an Italian perspective and provides readers with a dazzling, if succinct, entry into a world which remains murky and mysterious. It has the merit of relying on a wide variety of archival sources: from diplomatic correspondence and official edicts to avvisi culled from Spanish and Italian archives in addition to a wealth of primary sources. The result is a book which brings to life the players and powers affected by the activities of these pirates who, acting on behalf of the Ottoman Barbary states, constituted an important factor in the balance between European powers and the Sublime Porte. As Varriale shows, through their activities the barbary pirates were a force to be reckoned with and they had a profound impact on the shaping of collective and individual identities in the early modern Mediterranean, the “sour sea” which he so tellingly evokes in the well-chosen title, especially through their role in the commerce of captives.

The book is a welcome addition to a growing bibliography, well-deserving of a place among the works of scholars such as Salvatore Bono, Emilio Sola, Jacques Heers, and Francesco Giuseppe Romeo. In its treatment of the capture, imprisonment, enslavement, and redemption of Christians it also takes into account and adds to the work of scholars such as Miguel Ángel Bunes Ibarra, María Antonia Garcés, Steven Hutchinson, Rafael M. Pérez García, María Dolores Torreblanca Roldán, José Antonio Martínez Torres, Michele Bosco, Daniel Hershenzon, Valentina Oldrati, and Francesco Caprioli. While concentrating on the Italian world in the sixteenth century, the author directs his attention equally to the Hispanic monarchy, so intimately intertwined with the Italian peninsula of the period. The book sheds light on both contexts in approximately equal measure.

The volume is divided into four chapters. The first (Violenza) deals with the forays of privateers that were fundamentally centered around raiding coastal towns and the capture of Christians for the payment of ransom by religious orders, states, and families, especially in the south of Italy, which was part of the Hispanic monarchy. In it he treats his reader to an overview of the activities of some well-known corsairs such as Dragut and Hayreddin Barbarossa, that influenced the collective Italian imagination regarding this marauding menace and the Ottoman empire in general. The second (Le reazioni italiane alla minaccia dei barbareschi) provides an overview of the response to the threat of the Barbary pirates on the part of the diverse states of the Italian peninsula and the power dynamics between them to respond to the menace. From the Papal States to the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily, Venice, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, and Genova, Varriale shows how a collective unified response was often elusive as individual states had to balance their own interests with those of the larger peninsula, which was not always easy or obvious. The intricate behind the scenes diplomacy which he so meticulously reconstructs is a testimony to just how complicated relations between the states were, even in the face of a perceived common enemy. In chapter three (Dall’altro lato della frontiera), Varriale deals with the Ottoman empire on whose behalf the corsairs acted, stressing its complexity and varied nature and its interconnectedness with the European world, given the sea which they shared and the various frontier spaces in which encounters were possible. Varriale demonstrates how the Ottoman and Italian worlds were, of necessity, in constant diplomatic contact in spite of conflict, highlighting the many agents who circulated between the two areas exchanging news and information.

The final chapter (Connessioni) deals extensively with the veritable commerce surrounding the ransom of captives taken by Barbary pirates, and how different Italian states and religious orders organized themselves to muster funds to free people in captivity, held mainly in the North of Africa. In it the author relies on an array of archival documents which allow readers to see just how these efforts to free captives could be complex and economically taxing. The vast network of spies and informants required to man the operation and provide information about people being held in captivity is often mesmerizing and Varriale brings it to life in vivid detail. He also shows how the captivity of Christians was a problem on many levels, with religious renegades, apostates, and the dubious orthodoxy of captives posing a host of challenges for the Catholic Church and Italian states in the sixteenth century. Though relatively brief, the book is vast in its scope, including the information it provides and the context it evokes. While providing readers with much new data, it is not merely descriptive. It engages with the complexity of the Italian context of the sixteenth century and its interactions with the Ottoman world, despite mutual diffidence and ignorance.