Jolly Roger

Painting showing a French First Republic privateer flying a black Jolly Roger, signed and dated “Nicolas Cammillieri pinxit 1811”, with the inscription: “On the 14 Germinal year 7 of the French Republic (3 April 1796), in the Bay of Colonia on the coast of Spain, 4-hour long fight of the privateer Mouche, armed with an 8-pounder swivel gun, under Captain Jean Adrian, against a 16-nine-pounder gun cutter, to recapture the prize called Lavantoroso (?) which said privateer had captured the previous night while [the cutter] was escorting [the contested prize]”.

The Jolly Roger was the ensign flown by a pirate ship preceding or during an attack, during the early 18th century (the latter part of the Golden Age of Piracy). The vast majority of such flags flew the motif of a human skull, or “Death's Head”, often accompanied by other elements, on a black field, sometimes called the "Death's Head flag" or just the "black flag".