Inaccuracies of Hollywood

Many have watched and laughed during the first Pirates when Singapore was mentioned in the same breath as the whale bone corset being stripped off expertly by Jack. Well, Singapore was again mentioned in the second Pirates when Will Turner was looking for Jack. Apparently he was on our shores.

Or did he really?

The setting of the movie didn't seem to be in the early 19th century, which was when Singapore was officially called Singapore by the East India Company. 1819 right? Raffles and all that. So how could Jack and other pirates know about Singapore. Singapura or Temasek maybe, but Singapore???

And some of the seamen were using the word "port". Well, port is a new label as well. Much used only in the late 19th century. The portside of a ship used to be larboard. there was starboard....and it sounded similar to starboard so larboard was dropped. But the origin of the words, starboard and larboard was this: starboard is the steering side, where the rudder was. So it's like an old form of English...and larboard was where goods were laden from while ship is in harbour. Simple logic is because the ships do not want to risk their rudders hitting the wharf hence they always berth with the larboard side. Larboard sounded to similar to starboard and hence Port was chosen instead. reflecting how the ships of yesterday loaded things from.