Black Tudors by Miranda Kaufmann

Black Tudors by Miranda Kaufmann – The Untold Story. I got this book from the library after hearing about it at a seminar on slavery. The book is not about slaves and that is what makes it so different. I’ve enjoyed it, although the author sometimes talks too much about all sort of details and it can make one lose track, especially if you are not reading a chapter in one go. Even so, I gave the book 4.5 stars and I would recommend it.

It is quite fascinating. When I got the book and showed it to my husband, he was very surprised to find out that there were black Tudors. I was surprised too, this was before the slavery took off and, even after that, there weren’t many slaves in Britain. Actually, there wasn’t a law that allowed people to have slaves in the British Isles.

The book has 10 stories of black people living in Tudor England. Each one has its own chapter. I’m going to say their names and their occupation, so you can have a sense of how different these people were:
– John, a trumpeter at Henry VIII’s court
– Jacques, a salvage diver with an impressive set of skills
– Diego, a circumnavigator
– Edward, a Porter who whipped a white man
– Reasonable, a silk weaver
– Mary, a housemaid from Morocco
– Dederi, an African Prince who lived and studied in London
– John, a mariner
– Anne, a prostitute with a soft skin who demanded 5 times the price of the others
– Cattelena, a single-woman who lived in the countryside

It was fascinating to read all those details about them. It is a remarkable book, mostly because sheds light on something is not mainstream, so we don’t know about it.

Black Tudors by Miranda Kaufmann

Details about the picture: –
My rating: 4.5/5 Stars.
Would I recommend it: Yes
Published by: ONEWORLD Publications
Year it was published: 2017
Format: Hardcover
Genre(s): Non-fiction. History.
Pages: 376

About the author: Dr. Miranda Kaufmann is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, part of the School of Advanced Study, University of London. She read History at Christ Church, Oxford, where she completed her doctoral thesis on ‘Africans in Britain, 1500-1640’ in 2011. As a freelance historian and journalist, she has worked for The Sunday Times, the BBC, the National Trust, English Heritage, the Oxford Companion series, Quercus publishing and the Rugby Football Foundation. She is a popular speaker at conferences, seminars and schools from Hull to Jamaica and has published articles in academic journals and elsewhere (including the Times Literary Supplement, The Times, The Guardian, History Today, BBC History Magazine and Periscope Post). She enjoys engaging in debate at the intersection of past and present and has been interviewed by Sky News and the Observer.
Website & Social Media Links: www.mirandakaufmann.com