Guerre de Course

Introduction

In a recent post on the History Stack Exchange a question was asked which may be paraphrased as

Why were cruisers (in the pre-missile age) used for anything other than commerce raiding.

I provided an answer there where I used the term Guerre de Course and added after its first use the parenthetical suggestion that the reader should Google the term. Now along comes someone with sufficient privilege to edit my post and removes my parenthetical remark and makes Guerre de Course itself into a link to the Wikipedia page on Commerce Raiding. What I take exception to is that if I wanted to provide a link I would have done so, Why did I not do so? Because I want to encourage readers to do at least some of the work themselves, and learn to do research, after all it is not difficult in the age of the interwebs. Well I am disinclined to remove the edit, but the affair has prompted me to write something anout the topic here, and if I like what I write perhaps to publish it elsewhere.

Definition and Etymology

I expect that most readers know that Guerre de Course is a French term meaning a naval war or campaign against merchant shipping or trade. Now Wikipedia and other sources rather than give a proper etymology of the expression just tell us that it is translated literally as  "war of race" or something equivalent and uninformative.

Now what I observe is that a better translation would be "war of the corsairs". Where corsair is a term meaning pirate or a pirate ship (often specifically a Barbary Pirate). This of course now explains the meaning of the term Guerre de Course = War of Piracy which is descriptive of the actual practice (with only a modicum of hyperbole as pre-20th Century it was often conducted with/by Privateers - you may note that on that link a privateer is also described as a corsair).

We might also note in passing that the word Course is derived from the Latin cursus which among its other meanings has run rather than chase. Which reminds me of the Byzantine warship type: Dromon (from Greek for running). While the ships used by the Barbary Pirates may not them selves have been descended from the Dromon at least the Latinate term to describe them may well be. Doing an image search however does indicate a possible evolutionary connection between the galleys used by the Barbary pirates and the dromon.

Reconstruction of an early 10thcentury Byzantine bireme dromon,
based on the Tactica of Emperor Leo VI the Wise.

Illustration of a galley running before the wind, found in The Story of the Barbary Corsairs' by Stanley Lane-Poole, published in 1890 by G.P. Putnam's Sons.

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