Although the Western aristocracy always likes to pull what chivalry, implying that they are all descendants of knights, today's descendants of knights have long declined in Europe, and the descendants of pirates are the biggest source of Western aristocrats. In Western history, there are many descendants of knights and nobles, for example, there are a large number of nobles in France who claim that their families originate from Charlemagne, are authentic knights, and no one has ever been to the sea in the family, but now the French aristocracy has long declined, and most of today's European nobles have worked part-time as pirates.
The British Empire is the most typical example of "not being a man", after the Norman conquest, the Saxon nobles were slaughtered, the lucky ones also disappeared in the long river of history, and the Norman nobles who won the Saxon nobles were mostly descendants of Vikings. Time has passed, the British nobility's pirate genes have not changed, during the reign of Elizabeth I, the pirate business is the most profitable business in the whole of Britain, and the biggest investor in this business is the nobility.
Between 1585 and 1586, the British government issued privateership permits for 88 merchant ships, and the top nobles around the Queen invested in more than 20 of them, and the rest of the ships were basically invested by nobles. The business paid off so much that in the last 15 years of the 16th century, pirate trading contributed £2.5 million to the British treasury, an eight-year revenue from the British treasury, bringing back £13 million worth of stolen goods to the whole of Britain, and the risks of merchant ship captains, the shelter of the nobles and military supplies were the most common ways of cooperation in this business. In the 17th and 18th centuries, British aristocrats and squires also served as captains of the navy, and the British navy still retained the style of the privateers, with an open robbery auction system.
The descendants of the Vikings also included the Russian nobility, who became the earliest aristocratic class in Eastern European lands after running down the river to the lands of the Slavs. Viking giants such as Rurik established cities such as Novgorod and took their esteemed Slavs to the Byzantine Empire further east to rob and make money, which constituted the earliest common memory of Rus' society. The origins of Russian nobles and pirates did not stop there, the Cossacks snatched from the Black Sea to Heilongjiang in improvised boats, and the Koreans who fought with them even called them "Wokou" (Koreans were forcibly recruited by the Qing Dynasty to fight the Northeast to fight the Russians, and the Koreans called all the strongmen from the water wukou at that time), and the best of them became Russian nobles.
Although the German nobility had little to do with Vikings, many had also worked as a promising profession as a pirate. Don't think that the Junker aristocracy is all the German nobility, the Junker aristocracy is a small character in the history of the German nobility, and the predecessors of the Junker nobility are also big players in pirate trading. At the end of the 14th century, many of the low-ranking nobles around the Baltic Sea, although gritting their teeth to maintain their superficial brilliance and aristocratic pomp, had long since fallen into "unfortunate poverty". For the nobility, it was impossible to calculate carefully, and it was even more impossible to do business and work for people. The low-ranking German nobles bought and sold to the sea, and the big nobles who were tight on hand would also organize groups to rob and invest at sea, and the German nobles were not ashamed, they thought that robbery and plunder were only "small evils" and "insignificant sins", and said that "idle wandering or robbery are harmless; the most good people in the world will also do such things", and many nobles have become the leaders of pirates.
Italian aristocrats also inherited the traditions of ancient Greece and Rome, in the city-state era, a major side business of the ancient Greek family was agricultural robbery, all gentiles can be legally robbed, Odysseus and other heroes have also guest pirates, Renaissance Italian nobles guest pirates are not ashamed but proud. The seemingly never-ending struggles in the italian urban republics of the Middle Ages, and the destruction of the properties of many nobles, who invested in themselves and smashed their equipment "in search of maintaining their standard of living by engaging in sea raids and road robberies."
In 1464 Paulo Frégosso, Duke and Archbishop of Genoa, also became a pirate. His Holiness the Pope did not care about these things at all, because Italy also had a pirate Pope John XXIII, and as long as the pirates were dedicated in time, the Church did not bother who was robbed at sea. In the late Middle Ages, even the knighthood model, the Knights Hospitaller, was frequently involved in pirate trading, and the red-bearded Barbarossa was even a victim of the Knights Hospitaller.
Nobles in other parts of Europe also have the experience of cameo pirates, the source of power of the nobility is land, the output of land is limited, and the pomp and circumstance of the nobility is unlimited, the European nobility has monopolized the use of force, war and plunder have become the most effective means of wealth for the nobles. This admiration for war and plunder affected the entire Western high society, and anyone who thinks that they have made their fortunes in the spirit of contract and the spirit of nobility is very stupid and naïve.