Pilfered Pirate Pate

Unsorted trash:

WHEN fearsome Baltic pirate Klaus Stortebeker was executed 600 years ago, his headless body is said to have walked 12m along the length of Hamburg quayside. He had struck a deal with the elders of the port: any of his 70 men he managed to pass in his post-decapitation walk should be spared. The quivering corpse passed 11 fellow pirates before the executioner put out a foot and tripped him up.

Little wonder, then, that the skull of Stortebeker has fascinated Germans for so long -- and that its theft from a Hamburg museum last month has kept police busy. They interrogated members of the often reckless FC St Pauli fan club and dug deep into the city's Goth scene, before concentrating on a new possibility: that the pirate's skull has become a trophy in the turf wars between rival biker gangs.

On Saturday night, a skull was placed outside the offices of the Hamburger Morgenpost with "No Tacos" written on its crown. Tacos is slang for the biker group Bandidos, which is challenging the Hell's Angels for control over northern Germany's lucrative drugs trade...

The possibility that Stortebeker, who was decapitated in October 1401 (or a year earlier, by some accounts), aged 40, was little more than a bloodthirsty crook has not detracted from his iconic status.

No, it wouldn't. In fact, such an artifact would strongly attract the sort of criminal scum who naturally gravitate to "one percenter" motorcycle clubs. I attended a couple meetings of the so-called Confederation of Clubs here in Houston, which was essentially just a run-down icehouse crammed full of stinking Bandidos and Amigos and Soldiers for Jesus. I've never seen such a sorry collection of wanna-be tough guys and petty thugs in my life. They're exactly the same sort of societal vermin as pirates, so it's natural they should feel kinship with an executed pirate. I'd be delighted were such kinship extended to its logical conclusion.

___
Hat-tip to Vizigoth