Queen Anne’s Revenge: A Very Lore-Ful Site

Abstract

The combination of academic research with popular culture and local lore is a powerful driver of efforts to locate significant shipwrecks and to sustain interest in their subsequent recovery, conservation, and exhibition. The Queen Anne’s Revenge Project is an exemplar of this. Blackbeard’s flamboyant reputation made him a staple of pirate literature and strongly influenced the art of Howard Pyle and other artists, whose work became the basis for the twentieth-century popular perspective of pirates and piracy, especially in films. Hollywood also succumbed to the Blackbeard legend, enough even to prompt production of multiple movies about him. Hundreds of contributions by scholars and more popular writers have enriched the literature of Blackbeard and his flagship with books, articles, and presentations. Artists and illustrators have found subjects in the man, the ship, and the artifacts themselves. Blackbeard and Queen Anne’s Revenge appear in documentaries, docudramas, and feature films, and as toys, plastic kits, and even Lego sets. Businesses, from carwashes to subdivisions, have adopted their names. The tourism industry additionally exploits Blackbeard with T-shirts, baseball caps, flags and banners, playing cards, and other souvenirs, including figurines, key chains, bumper stickers, and similar bric-a-brac. This lore, most importantly, also draws millions of visitors to exhibitions of the conserved artifacts from the Queen Anne’s Revenge site staged around the country (and overseas) The success of these exhibitions, allying popular culture, local lore, and academic rigor, clearly demonstrates that the general public can find archaeology exciting and, therefore, worthy of support.