Obelisk to the Corsairs

The Obelisk to the Corsairs stands as a sandstone pillar topped by a bronze statue of a woman, rising high above the harbor of Ibiza. It commemorates the local ship captains who were commissioned by the Spanish crown to harass enemy vessels during the eighteenth century. When a British ship once attempted to enter the port, a local corsair captain named Antonio Riquer captured the vessel in a fierce open-sea engagement. The townspeople erected this monument to honor those daring, state-sanctioned pirates.