Arrr! Talk Like a Pirate Day 2006

’Tis still September 19th here. That be International Talk Like a Pirate Day, mateys. A fun little “holiday” invented by Americans John Baur and Mark Summers a bunch a voyages round t’sun ago.

Official Site, with

• pirate dictionary and
• English-to-piratese translator

Baur and Summers’ Pirate “Five A’s” Instructional Video (ahoy, avast, aye, aye-aye, arrr)

Link to video

2002 article by American humor columnist Dave Barry that popularized it

The conventional wisdom is that “arrr” and other stereotyped pirate talk come from one or more dialects of the seafaring West Country area of England, such as Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall. There’s some discussion on that on Language Log from last year’s TLAPD, plus the Corsair Ergonomic Keyboard for Pirates.

Remember t’talk as if you be a pirate ’til your friends tell you to “avast” (“stop” just won’t do today).