How to Talk Like a Pirate

The essential words

Ahoy

Hello. Used to hail a ship or a person from a distance.

Avast

Stop, or pay attention. Short for a Dutch phrase meaning "hold fast".

Arr / Arrr

An all-purpose grunt of agreement, enthusiasm or menace. No fixed spelling.

Matey

Friend, shipmate. Attach it to the end of any sentence for instant pirate.

Bilge rat

An insult. The bilge is the dirtiest, lowest part of a ship.

Landlubber

Someone unfamiliar with the sea. A gentle insult for anyone who hasn't left dry land.

Hornswaggle

To cheat or trick someone.

Shiver me timbers

An exclamation of shock or surprise, as if the ship's timbers themselves shook.

Weigh anchor

To lift the anchor and set sail; used loosely to mean "let's go".

Booty

Treasure, loot, plunder.

Scallywag

A rascal, a rogue, said with affection more often than real contempt.

Davy Jones' locker

The bottom of the sea; where drowned sailors and lost ships end up.

Try the translator

Type a normal sentence and we will pirate it up for you. See the widget on the home page.

Where the accent actually comes from

Here is the part most pirate-day articles skip: real 18th-century sailors did not talk like this. The "pirate accent" almost everyone imagines, the rolling Rs, the West Country burr, the "arrr" itself, comes overwhelmingly from one performance: Robert Newton playing Long John Silver in Disney's 1950 film Treasure Island. Newton was from the West Country of England, and he leaned hard into his own natural regional accent for the role. It was so vivid and so memorable that it became the template every pirate impression since has copied, including the entire premise of this holiday. Real pirates came from all over the world and would have sounded like wherever they were actually from. The Robert Newton accent is folklore built on one great performance, not history. That does not make it any less fun to do for a day.