Cross-Cultural Perceptions of Piracy: Maritime Violence in the Western Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf Region during a Long Eighteenth Century

In the 1690s, a daring and competent mariner named Kanhoji Angre (or Angria) achieved both fame and notoriety along the coast of west central India. He was a sometime ally of the Marathas, and shared their goal of resisting Mughal imperial expansion. In diplomatic exchanges, the Mughals represented him as an enemy. The English East India Company (EIC), however, categorized him as a pirate because he and his men had attacked several company vessels. Some historians have depicted Kanhoji as a champion of Indian resistance to Europeans.