10. Blackbeard
The name Blackbeard and pirates go together like peanut butter and jelly. In most movies, he’s depicted as being greedy, chaotic, and rather scary. Other times, he’s seen as being like Robin Hood stealing from the rich to pay for his own free lifestyle. One historic record says, “struck lighted matches under his hat, which appearing on each side of his face, his eyes naturally looking fierce and wild, made him altogether such a figure that imagination cannot form an idea of a fury, from hell, to look more frightful”. In real life, his name was Edward Teach. Historians believe that a lot of these stories were hyperbole, and that the legend of Blackbeard was twisted more and more as time went on. Most likely, the name is kind of like “The Dread Pirate Roberts” from The Princess Bride. It’s a legend, rather than a man.
Read too: Female Pirates Who Were Every Bit as Fearsome as Blackbeard.