Errors in geography: Port Royal, Jamaica, is built on a low spit of sand south of Kingston Harbor, nowhere more than about ten feet above sea level. The movie set has it built atop hundred-foot basaltic cliffs.
Factual errors: Elizabeth Swann's maid fills a bed warmer with red-hot coals and then places the warmer at the feet of Elizabeth, who is lying in bed. That's not the way bed warmers were used. They held warm, not red-hot, coals, and were placed in bed before one turned in and removed before the sleeper lay down. If used as shown in the movie, they would have barbecued one's feet.
Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Sparrow has no problems sliding down the rope using his handcuffs because the chain is long enough for him to be able to throw a loop of chain over the rope and grab it in his other hand. When he reaches the bottom, he lets go and the rope is released without his having to undo the cuffs or untie the rope (or even detach one of his hands as one viewer suggested).
Continuity: At the beginning of the movie, the chains on Sparrow's handcuffs are long enough for him to be able to throw a loop of chain over the rope and grab it in his other hand, but later in the movie when Sparrow is trying to take off his handcuffs the chain is much shorter (not long enough to throw a loop over the rope as he did earlier).
Continuity: When Captain Jack is escaping and fighting Will in the blacksmith's shop, his shirt cuffs keep altering from being under the manacles to being further up his arms. This also happens earlier on, when he is swinging in a circle to escape the guards at Port Royal.
Continuity: When Barbosa is chasing the Interceptor, as he is shouting commands, in one shot his teeth are perfectly white, while in the rest of the movie they are decayed.
Continuity: Inside the treasure-filled cave, shafts of moonlight descend straight downward. However, the view outside shows the moon fairly low in the sky.
Anachronisms: Jack's execution uses a trapdoor-style gallows. This was not invented until the 1800s.
Anachronisms: At least twice during the movie, the left side of the ship is referred to as "port" (as in, "drop the port anchor"). "Larboard" was used until the 19th century when referring to the ship, and "port" was only for directions. "Hard a-port" or "turn to port" would have been used, but nothing referring to the port side of the ship until the 1800s.
Continuity: When Elizabeth is being chased through her house and hides in the dining room closet, the amount of the rug that is flipped over changes. At one point a long section of the rug is turned back, later, the turned back portion is much smaller.
Continuity: When Elizabeth takes the medallion out of the secret hiding place, her fingernails are short. When Captain Jack saves her from being shot during the battle between both ships, her nails are long and manicured.
Anachronisms: Shortly after having been rescued from the gallows, in one close-up Jack Sparrow can be seen wearing contact lenses (they were tinted lenses to stop him from squinting).
Factual errors: The chest of cursed Aztec gold , which Cortez was said to have taken from Mexico, depicts four representations of the primary image of the Sun Gate from the Tiahuanaco civilization, outside La Paz, Bolivia.
Continuity: When he hears Will coming, Jack leaves the piece of bone sticking in the cell lock. It subsequently disappears.
Continuity: After Jack and Will Fight at the end the Commodore's sword moves from right side to the left side of Will between takes
Audio/visual unsynchronized: When Will draws his sword on the Interceptor and tells Jack that his Bootstrap wasn't a pirate, the sword makes a metallic scraping noise, despite being tucked in his belt without a sheath of any kind.
Anachronisms: When Elizabeth discovers that the pirates are cursed, a pirate is seen sitting on the capstan playing a concertina. The concertina was not invented until 1829.
Revealing mistakes: When Jack had just escaped and is flying around in circles around the pole, the soldiers are told to shoot him. Many of them continue to shoot, without reloading.
Continuity: When Elizabeth is trying to save Captain Jack Sparrow just before he puts the chain of the handcuffs around her neck, the medallion is alternately in/out of her dress between shots.
Continuity: When Elizabeth first boards the Black Pearl, she is hit by the bo's'n and puts her left hand to her face, palm outwards. In the next shot, her hand is palm inward.
Incorrectly regarded as goofs: Will has a tattoo on his wrist which is visible in some shots. We are not told that Will is free of tattoos and the fact that *we* know it to be an "elvish" nine is of no consequence - it's just a pretty pattern.
Continuity: In the opening shots of young Elizabeth singing at the front of the ship, the posts on either side of her have rope on them (wrapped around them). Moments later, the post to her right has no rope wrapped around it or hanging from it.
Revealing mistakes: After Will And Jack commandeer the Interceptor, the ship is viewed from above, sailing on a beam reach (a point of sail in which the boat is at 90 degrees to the wind). When Jack knocks Will off the ship with the boom, he jibes the boat, causing the sail to shift positions so suddenly. In order to do this from the previous position, he would have had to turn the ship almost completely around. This would have taken well over a minute. Jack did this in less that three seconds. The sail is also filled to the wrong side while it sweeps Will off the deck.
Factual errors: HMS Dauntless and HMS Interceptor are shown flying the British Blue Ensign. Prior to 1864, the color of a Royal Navy vessel's ensign was determined by its posting. The color of the Caribbean squadron's ensign was red, as should have been the Dauntless' and Interceptor's (blue was the color of the south Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans).
Continuity: When Jack is talking Barbossa just before their final fight, he picks up a large gold idol and tosses it away. In the next shot, the idol has returned to its original position.
Crew or equipment visible: At the Isla del Muertes when Jack and Norrington are in the rowboat, discussing the dangers of ambush, (just after Jack's line, "Not if you're the one doing the ambushing"), a diver's green fin appears in the water to the right of the boat.
Continuity: When Jack meets his crew in Tortuga, the hand Annamaria is using to point at Jack changes from her right to her left, then back to right again as they discuss replacing her ship.
Continuity: When Jack and Barbossa are fighting, Barbossa plunges Jacks sword into Jack. When it goes in, it is below Jack's leather strap. When we see Jack as a skeleton, the sword is above the leather strap.
Continuity: A shot opens with the full moon prominent in the frame. The moon is crossed by the sails of The Black Pearl at an angle that indicates that the moon is almost straight overhead. We pull back to show the ship gliding past, and when it has, we are looking at the horizon, where we see the full moon very close to setting.
Factual errors: There is a full moon every night.
Revealing mistakes: When the Dauntless is about to run over the rowboat containing Gillette, the rowboat begins to breakup before the Dauntless touches it.
Anachronisms: In the beginning of the Commodore's promotion ceremony "Rule Britannia" is played in the yard. The song was not composed until 1740.
Revealing mistakes: Right before Norrington proposes to Elizabeth, there is a close-up of musicians. Even though there are to strings on the cello, the man seems to be playing it fairly well.