{"id":3778449,"date":"2021-01-27T11:12:01","date_gmt":"2021-01-27T10:12:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/escales.ponant.com\/?p=3778449"},"modified":"2026-03-02T14:26:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T13:26:36","slug":"pirate-la-buse-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/escales.ponant.com\/us\/pirate-la-buse-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Olivier Levasseur: on the trail of the lost treasure of the pirate La Buse"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Olivier Levasseur, historical figure or folk legend? Both, my captain! Since his death in 1730 in R\u00e9union, this famous French pirate, better known as La Buse, has lost none of his mystery and intrigue. And neither has his elusive lost loot, the stuff fantasies are made of and the focus of an astounding treasure hunt which began almost 300 years ago\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Pirate of the Caribbean<\/h3>\n

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Olivier Levasseur<\/strong>\u00a0was born in Calais at the end of the 17th century. The son of a freebooter, he had his first taste of maritime combat at the start of the 18th century, on board La Reine des Indes (The Indian Queen). At that time, Levasseur was operating in the\u00a0<\/span>Caribbean Sea<\/a>\u00a0as a\u00a0<\/span>privateer\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>in the service of a French king embroiled in the War of the Spanish Succession.<\/span><\/p>\n

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When the conflict ended in 1714, Versailles no longer needed its privateers. However, Levasseur was not going to return to mainland France. He became a\u00a0<\/span>pirate<\/strong>, first under the flag of the Englishman, Benjamin Hornigold then under his own name. Levasseur thus built up a solid reputation. That of a formidable predator, swooping down on his victims with all the speed of a bird of prey. He was nicknamed\u00a0<\/span>La Buse<\/strong>\u00a0(The Buzzard)!<\/span><\/p>\n

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On the route to India<\/h3>\n

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The Caribbean waters became increasingly perilous : the\u00a0<\/span>war on pirates<\/strong>\u00a0carried out by the colonial powers became more and more gruelling. For\u00a0<\/span>La Buse<\/strong>, it was time to get out. His target?\u00a0<\/span>The route to India<\/strong>\u00a0and the\u00a0<\/span>African coast<\/a>. First off, in 1719, he headed to the Gulf of Guinea then, the following year, to the Indian Ocean and the Mascarene Islands. Levasseur dropped anchor at \u00cele Sainte-Marie, the impregnable hideout for pirates, close to\u00a0<\/span>Madagascar<\/strong>. There he met the English pirate John Taylor with whom he joined forces.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Attack at Bourbon<\/h3>\n

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26th April 1721 is fixed forever as a milestone in the history of piracy. That day, La Buse and Taylor were heading towards \u00cele Bourbon (present-day\u00a0<\/span>R\u00e9union<\/a>). In their crosshairs: the Nossa Senhora do Cabo or The Virgin of the Cape, an 800-ton Portuguese flagship with 72 cannons, moored in Saint-Denis harbour after suffering serious damage. On board was the Count of Ericeira, Viceroy of Portuguese India, and in its hold was almost\u00a0<\/span>ten years of accumulated treasures<\/strong>\u00a0: gold, diamonds, jewellery, spices, cloth, fine wood and more. After heavy fighting, La Buse and Taylor seized the ship and its spectacular loot, estimated at over\u00a0<\/span>4 billion euros<\/strong>\u00a0! The Virgin of the Cape was renamed Le Victorieux (The Victorious) and became Olivier Levasseur\u2019s powerful new ship.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The birth of a myth<\/h3>\n

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In 1724, making the most of the\u00a0<\/span>charter of clemency<\/strong>\u00a0offered to freebooters by the king of France,\u00a0<\/span>La Buse<\/strong>\u00a0decided to retire to \u00cele Sainte-Marie. No more piracy! But he refused to give back his treasure, a precondition of the royal amnesty. Levasseur thus tried to lie low by working as a pilot for ships in Antongil Bay\u2026 But in 1729, La Buse was recognised and taken in shackles to \u00cele Bourbon to be\u00a0<\/span>tried<\/strong>. He was quickly sentenced: death by hanging.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cWith what I\u2019ve hidden not far from here, I could buy the entire island\u201d, he supposedly revealed to his gaoler. And on the day of his execution, on the gallows, with the rope around his neck, he is said to have thrown\u00a0<\/span>a mysterious cryptogram<\/strong>\u00a0to the crowd while shouting: \u201cFind my treasure he who can!\u201d starting a\u00a0<\/span>myth<\/strong>\u00a0and, with it, an astounding treasure hunt. Although in 1934, the historian Charles de La Ronci\u00e8re was the first to publish a translation of the coded message, the text remains unintelligible. Incidentally, is it even a text? Even now, many people try to\u00a0<\/span>decipher the document<\/strong>\u00a0wanting to get their hands on La Buse\u2019s treasure: from R\u00e9union to\u00a0<\/span>Seychelles<\/a>, from Mauritius to Rodrigues right up to Juan de Nova, every island in the Indian Ocean is a safe and we must find the key.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n

So, this treasure, is it a dream or reality? A bit of both\u2026 Although it seems unlikely that the cryptogram is authentic, the puzzle and curiosity that it has generated for three centuries are very real, making the myth of the pirate La Buse, now a key figure in the folklore of the Indian Ocean, last forever.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Follow in the footsteps of La Buse<\/p>\n

[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=\u201d4.16\u2033 _module_preset=\u201ddefault\u201d text_text_color=\u201d#ffffff\u201d width=\u201d70%\u201d width_tablet=\u201d100%\u201d width_phone=\u201d\u201d width_last_edited=\u201don|desktop\u201d global_colors_info=\u201d{}\u201d theme_builder_area=\u201dpost_content\u201d]<\/p>\n

Scattered Islands, Madagascar, Seychelles, discover the Indian Ocean with Ponant.<\/p>\n

[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_button button_url=\u201dhttps:\/\/us.ponant.com\/destinations\/southern-africa\u201d url_new_window=\u201don\u201d button_text=\u201dDISCOVER THE SEYCHELLES\u201d button_alignment=\u201dleft\u201d _builder_version=\u201d4.27.5\u2033 _module_preset=\u201ddefault\u201d custom_margin=\u201d20px||20px||false|false\u201d hover_enabled=\u201d0\u2033 global_colors_info=\u201d{}\u201d theme_builder_area=\u201dpost_content\u201d sticky_enabled=\u201d0\u2033][\/et_pb_button][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Olivier Levasseur, historical figure or folk legend? Both, my captain! Since his death in 1730 in R\u00e9union, this famous French pirate, better known as La Buse, has lost none of his mystery and intrigue. And neither has his elusive lost loot, the stuff fantasies are made of and the focus of an astounding treasure hunt which began almost 300 years ago…”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3778525,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1189],"tags":[],"thematique":[1478],"class_list":["post-3778449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-get-inspired-us","thematique-history-and-heritage-us"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nOlivier Levasseur: on the trail of the lost treasure of the pirate La Buse | PONANT US Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"By throwing his coded message to the crowd just before his death, Olivier Levasseur turned his story into a legend. Even now, the pirate La Buse is one of the Indian Ocean\u2019s greatest myths.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/escales.ponant.com\/us\/pirate-la-buse-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Olivier Levasseur: on the trail of the lost treasure of the pirate La Buse | PONANT US Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By throwing his coded message to the crowd just before his death, Olivier Levasseur turned his story into a legend. 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