Pirate Culture
Plutarch recounts a particular custom of the Cilician pirates. When a prisoner of theirs called out he was Roman, the pirates would pretend to be scared and beg for mercy. If the prisoner took the pirate's mockery in earnest, they would dress him in Greek athletic shoes and a toga, that they might not repeat the mistake. After they were satisfied mocking him, they would lower a ladder into the sea, and, wishing him a fortuitous journey, invite him to step off. If the man wouldn't go of his own accord, they would push him overboard.
According to Plutarch, the Cilician pirates were the first to celebrate the mysteries of Mithras. When some of these were resettled in Apulia by Pompey, they might have brought the religion with them, thus sowing the seeds of what would in the latter part of the 1st century AD blossom into Roman Mithraism. (See R. Turcan, The Cults of the Roman Empire, Blackwell, 1996; pages 201-203)
Read more about this topic: Cilician Pirates
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