Description

The most famous Muslim privateer was born on the Greek island of Lesbos, then under Turkish control. He developed his reputation as a privateer in the early sixteenth century; Together with his brother Aruch, from his base in Algiers, he managed to control trade in the Mediterranean under the auspices of the Turkish Empire and become a nightmare for the Spanish empire and for the other Christian states of his time.
After the death of Aruch, Barbarroja was named admiral of the Ottoman fleet by Suleiman I, and joined forces with the king of France, Francisco I, to unleash a blunt offensive against the king of Spain Carlos V; only the peace of Crépy, agreed between France and Spain in 1544, put an end to its attacks.