Miranda Kaufmann
Find me on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and YouTube...
  • Home
  • Bio
  • Blog
  • Talks
  • History
  • Reviews
    • Book Reviews
    • Art and Theatre Reviews
  • Features
  • Food & Travel
  • Rugby
  • Contact

"Egyptians" in Early Modern England?

4/12/2013

2 Comments

 
PictureAct concerning 'Egyptians', 1530 HLRO HL/PO/PU/1/1530/22H8n9. Click on image for transcription.
I was delighted to hear Onyeka talking about Africans in Tudor England yesterday morning on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme. It's fantastic this subject is getting airtime, and we must all hope that translates to lesson time in schools, university courses and research, and further media coverage. 

It was a very short discussion (for a longer one, see this interview with Vox Africa TV; for more detail on the status of Africans in Tudor England, see my articles on "Slavery and English Common Law"; on "Why Slavery shouldn't distort the History of Black People in Britain" and the case of Caspar van Senden and his failed attempts to transport Africans from Britain in 1596-1601).

However I was puzzled by Onyeka's reference to an African in Tudor Blackburn, so I looked it up in his book and found (on p.361) a reference to the baptism of "Leticia" whose father is described as "Willm Voclentine Egiptian", on 3rd December 1602 in the record of St. Mary's, Blackburn, now held at the Lancashire Record Office. 

Other similar examples I found in my research  include ‘Anthoine an Egyptian’, buried in Gravesend on 26 May 1553, and ‘Batholomew the sonne of an Egiptian’ baptized in Barnstaple on 23 August 1568.

However, I didn't include these references in my thesis because I didn't feel that they could be taken as straightforward evidence of individuals who came from Egypt. 

The people referred to as "Egyptians" at this time were ‘gypsies’, or Roma/Romany people, of Hindu origin. Both linguistic and genetic studies have confirmed their origin in the Indian subcontinent. A Parliamentary Act of 1530 concerning Egyptians (illustrated above, and transcribed here) explained that: 

"before this tyme divers and many owtlandisshe people calling themselfes Egiptsions using no craft nor faict of merchandise, have comen in to thys realme and goon from Shyre to Shyre and place to place in grete companye and used grete subtile and craftye meanys to deceyve the people bearing them in hande that they by palmestrye could tell menne and Womens Fortunes and soo many Tymes by craft and subtiltie hath deceyved the people of theyr Money & alsoo have comitted many haynous Felonyes and Robberyes to the grete hurt and Disceipt of the people that they have comyn among."

Further Acts concerning ‘Egyptians’ were passed in 1552, 1554, and 1562. They were to be banished, their goods forfeited. By 1562, this was somewhat modified by the ruling that those born in England were to be placed in service. 

The fact that these people did not come from Egypt was recognised by at least one contemporary writer. Thomas Dekker wrote in Lantern and Candlelight (1608): 

"If they be Egyptians, sure I am they never descended from the tribes of any of those people that came out of Egypt. Ptolemy, King of the Egyptians, I warrant never called them his subjects; no nor Pharoah before him."

For more on Egyptians in Early Modern England, have a look at Chapter 3 of D. Mayall, Gypsy Identities, 1500-2000: From Egipcyans and Moon-men to the Ethnic Romany (2004). 

When an individual really is of African origin, the records are not slow to report or comment on it. It is only when an individual is described as ‘a/the blackamore’, ‘a/the negro’, or we are told where they come from or were born that we can be completely sure of their identities. 

 There is enough certain evidence of Africans in Tudor England (for example, this list of references found in London parishes, one of which is pictured below; my own research gathered evidence of over 360 Africans in Britain, 1500-1640, some 200 of which date from the Tudor period) to work with, without having to include these misleadingly-named "Egyptians". 

Picture
Burial of Domingo "A black neigro servant unto William Winter"- 27th August 1587, St. Botolph's, Aldgate. Died of consumption, aged 40. Record held at the London Metropolitan Archives, and currently on display in their The Parish exhibition.

Since first posting this, Michael Ohajuru, art historian and author of the Black Africans in Renaissance Europe blog, has pointed out that the image above isn't that easy to decipher. Below is an annotated version. Where it says "East" ( in most of the entries on this page), it means they were buried in the east end of the graveyard. 
Picture
2 Comments
Michael Ohajuru link
4/12/2013 12:22:16 am

Speaking of Egyptians I am minded of one of my favourite etomologies from the OED - for Kushti - Quote Romani (in Britain and Scandinavia) kushto, kushti good, perhaps influenced by cushy adj. Compare Hindi khush, pleasure unQuote

Reply
Kerry Hawkins
27/2/2018 10:30:14 am

There is an earlier reference to the arrival of Egyptians here in Hampshire. The parish register of Heckfield 1543 "Egiptii manserunt apud Hekfyld 15, 16 et 17 diebus Martii".

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Dr. Miranda Kaufmann is a historian of Black British History living in North Wales. You can read a fuller bio here, and contact her here.

    Related Blogs/Sites

    Michael Ohajuru's Black Africans in Renaissance Europe blog

    Temi Odumosu's The Image of Black website

    The UCL Legacies of British Slave-ownership project Database and blog

    The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

    The Black Presence in Britain

    Jeffrey Green's website, on Africans in 19th and early 20th Century Britain
     
    Untold Theatre 

    Categories

    All
    Africans In British Art
    Africans In Early Modern London
    Africans In Eighteenth Century England
    Africans In Renaissance Scotland
    Africans In Stuart England
    Africans In Tudor England
    Archives
    Black History
    Black History Month
    Early Modern England
    Exhibitions
    Heritage
    History
    Inclusive Curriculum
    Journalism
    Legal History
    Medical History
    National Curriculum
    Podcasts
    Politics
    Public History
    Radio History
    Research
    School History
    Shakespeare
    Slavery & Abolition
    Talks
    Travel
    Tv History

    Archives

    March 2025
    October 2022
    August 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    July 2021
    April 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    October 2019
    July 2019
    April 2019
    February 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    July 2018
    April 2018
    February 2018
    October 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    September 2016
    June 2016
    March 2016
    January 2016
    October 2015
    July 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    April 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    June 2013
    March 2013
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.