Black Spot (Treasure Island)

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The Black Spot is a fictional literary device invented by Robert Louis Stevenson for his novel Treasure Island. In the book, a pirate is presented with a "black spot" to officially pronounce a verdict of guilt or judgment. It consists of a circular piece of black paper or card placed in the hand of the accused. It was a source of much fear because it meant the pirate will be executed. In Treasure Island, Billy Bones is so frightened by it he suffers a stroke and dies. There is no record of "black spots" in reality and how Stevenson came up with the idea is unknown.

The Black Spot has since been used in other works of popular culture:

• 1930. In Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome, the Amazon Pirates give their Uncle, Captain Flint, a Black Spot on a piece of paper, with writing on the other side that says "You are deposed from being an uncle or anything decent" due to his ill-treatment of their friends.
• 1948. The short story "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson
• 1996. Muppet Treasure Island, a retelling of Treasure Island, the black spot is drawn on a piece of paper and given to Billy Bones. It's also given to Long John Silver on a page from the Bible. This causes him to get out of it by claiming they've defiled the holy book.
• 2002. "Puzzle Pirates", an MMORPG created by Three Rings Design, uses the term "Black Spot" to refer to a temporary way to silence rude and disruptive players.
• 2003. The 2003 video-game "Skies of Arcadia" presented players with a black spot, a message from a bounty hunter that they would soon be hunted down and killed.
• 2006. The Disney feature film, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Captain Jack Sparrow is presented with a literal Black Spot by Bootstrap Bill Turner as a marker that the Kraken can track; in the film, the black spot appears as a large black boil-like swelling, similar to one of the symptoms of bubonic plague.