Pirata chinesa cheng i sao biography

En garde! It’s the early 1800s and you have to worry about pirates stealing from you. As the pirates are racing towards you and you’re running away, do you know who is leading the charge? Do you think of famous pirates, like Blackbeard or other men? What if I told you that the most successful pirate was a Chinese woman? 

Zhen Yi Sao, originally called Ching Shih, was born in the coastal city of Guangzhou, China around 1775. Not much is known about Sao’s childhood or background before she became a pirate. Her name was first mentioned when she was working on a floating brothel. While working there, she gained a reputation as a shrewd business woman.

By 1801, Sao had married a man named Zheng Yi (also referred to as Cheng I). He most likely was one of her clients and it is not known how exactly they ended up together. One version of the story is that Yi asked Sao to be his wife, whilst another version is that Sao persuaded Yi to marry her.

When they were married, Yi was already powerful pirate: he helped lead pirates to re-establish power across the border in China. Sao helped her husband by being an organizer and consolidator for the pirates and they worked to unify small gangs into a confederation that eventually included 70,000 men. However, by 1807, Sao’s husband had died. She immediately set about taking control of the fleet herself. To help with that, she made Zhang Bao, her adopted son with Yi and his protégé, her second in command. At some point, they became husband and wife.

She created systems that enabled her to maintain power. For example, she set a code that would keep her men loyal to her, a severe code where death was a constant threat. If anyone was caught disobeying their superiors, it was automatic decapitation. If a man had a wife, he was supposed to be faithful or else he could be put to death.

Although the code was severe, she made sure to keep the pirates happy as we

By K. A. Lindstrom

Everyone knows of the famous pirate women Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who terrorized the Caribbean during the golden age of piracy in the early 18th century. They were reportedly ruthless, brave, and clever. However, the success of these women was nothing compared to the life of Cheng I Sao (alternatively called Zheng Yi Sao, Ching Shih, or Shi Yang), who was arguably the most successful pirate of all time.

Cheng I Sao was born several decades after the golden age of piracy, sometime around 1775. Her early life is shrouded in mystery. There are numerous tales of how she started her life of piracy, some of them clearly fictitious, though they make for exciting tales. One story claims she was working on a Cantonese flower boat (an entertainment vessel for sailors, which was the seafaring equivalent to a brothel or saloon) when she met her first husband, I Cheng. He ordered his sailors to bring several prostitutes aboard for him to choose one for a bride (it is not clear if Cheng I Sao was a prostitute before her marriage, but it is commonly shared as fact). Cheng I Sao (who was called Shi Yang before her marriage; Cheng I Sao translates to “wife of Cheng I”) was the most beautiful, so he chose her. She attacked him when asked if she would marry him, this making her even more attractive to the pirate captain. She said she would only marry him in exchange for control of half his pirate fleet and half of his overall wealth. Cheng I agreed and they married in 1801.

Though this story is unverifiable, it is unusual when placed in the context of this period. At the time, coastal women frequently sailed with their men, and family groups stayed together as they traded up and down the coasts. However, marriages were usually financial arrangements made by families. Women were not expected to own property, as Confucian teachings said, and a woman’s primary goal was to have sons, and all else was secondary. This story a

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One of most successful and least famous pirates of all time was Cheng I Sao, the female pirate (yes, women were pirates too!) who dominated the coast of the Kwangtung Province for fifteen years between 1795-1810.

In “One Woman’s Rise to Power: Cheng I’s Wife and the Pirates,” Dian Murray writes about Cheng I Sao, also known more simply as “Cheng I’s Wife” and her rise to power. Murray provides a vivid account of Cheng I’s wife and the calculated steps she took to dominate the Chinese coast—both on sea and land in some coastal towns. During her rise to fame, Cheng I Sao’s team of pirates dwarfed the Spanish Armada with “approximately 70,000 pirates aboard 1,200 vessels.”

Murray notes that much of her success was not in spite of her gender, but because of it. Cheng I Sao started her career as a pirate after leaving her earlier job as a prostitute to marry and join her husband at sea. Together, they organized pirate gangs and became powerful leaders. Murray notes that “their major achievement was the unification of small gangs into a formidable confederation that by 1804 included 400 junks and 70,000 men.” In 1807, when Cheng I died suddenly, Chang I Sao made a power move to take over.

Cheng I Sao started off by immediately securing both her position and status as the continued leader after Cheng I’s death. First, she got the support from her husband’s most powerful chieftains in order to preemptively squash any potential opposition parties that might arise. Next, she made sure to make herself indispensable to the pirate gangs that she and her husband had originally helped to unify. In doing so, she retained the squadron allegiance and support.

And finally, she developed a strict code of laws for her ships. Through well-enforced severe laws, Cheng I Sao maintained power. For instance, stealing from the villagers or from th

Chinese pirate (1775–1844)

Zheng Yi Sao (born Shi Yang; c. 1775–1844), also known as Shi Xianggu, Shek Yeung and Ching Shih, was a Chinese pirate leader active in the South China Sea from 1801 to 1810.

Born as Shi Yang in 1775 to humble origins, she married a pirate named Zheng Yi at age 26 in 1801. She was named Zheng Yi Sao ("wife of Zheng Yi") by the people of Guangdong. After the death of her husband in 1807, she took control of his pirate confederation with the support of Zheng Yi's adopted son Zhang Bao, with whom she entered into a relationship and later married. As the unofficial commander of the Guangdong Pirate Confederation, her fleet was composed of 400 junks and between 40,000 and 60,000 pirates in 1805. Her ships entered into conflict with several major powers, such as the East India Company, the Portuguese Empire, and the Great Qing.

In 1810, Zheng Yi Sao negotia