History of Free African Diaspora

Quotes

Juan Garrido, black in color... of his own free will, became a Christian in Lisbon, was in Castile for seven years, and crossed to Santo Domingo [for seven years]... From there he visited other islands then went to San Juan de Puerto Rico... [for] much time, [then]...came to New Spain. He was present at the taking of this city of Mexico and... other conquests, and later to the island with the marquis. He was the first to plant and harvest wheat in this land... and brought many vegetable seeds to New Spain.
- Juan Garrido (late 1540s) A short dictated Resume of his services to the crown, as translated by Peter Gerhard, A Black Conquistador in Mexico, Hispanic American Historical Review (1978) 58(3) pp. 451-459, referencing Icaza, Diccionario, no. 169. Epistolario de Nueva España, 1505-1818, recopilado por Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, 16 vols. (México, 1939-1942), Vol. 8-9. ...cf. Millares Carlo and Mantecón, Indice, II, no. 2647.

San Hipólito... one of the most interesting churches in the city. ...1520 ...the greatest slaughter of the Spaniards during the retreat of the memorable Noche Triste ...After the final conquest of the city, one of the survivors of that dismal night, Juan Garrido, having freshly in mind its bloody horrors, built of adobe at this place a little commemorative chapel.
- Thomas Allibone Janvier, The Mexican Guide (1890) 4th edition, pp. 206-7.

They lived in a world where skin colour was less important than religion, class or talent: before the English became heavily involved in the slave trade, and before they founded their first surviving colony in the Americas.
...Their stories challenge the traditional narrative that racial slavery was inevitable and that it was imported to colonial Virginia from Tudor England. They force us to re-examine the 17th century to find out what had caused perceptions to change so radically.
- Miranda Kaufmann, Black Tudors: The Untold Story (2017)

Juan Valiente (ca. 1505-1553) was probably born in West Africa and sold by slavers to Portuguese traders, who... sold him to... Alonso Valiente. ...[H]e was baptized ...and around 1530 ...arrived ...in Puebla, New Spain ...[as] a domestic servant. By 1533 he ...convinced ...Valiente to allow him to become a conquistador ...[H]e would ...record ...his earnings ...to return them to his owner. He went to Guatemala and joined Pedro de Alvarado's expedition to Peru... [which was bought out by] Diego de Almagro... By 1535 he was in Chile fighting the Araucanians with Almagro, became a captain by 1540, and was rewarded with an estancia near Santiago in 1546 and an encomienda in 1550. ...[H]e was killed by Araucanian Indians at the battle of Tucapel in 1553.
- Juan Valiente, "Unhorsed" Chiricu (2019) vol. 4, no. 1, fall 2019, p. 160.

A Black Conquistador in Mexico (1978)

by Peter Gerhard, Hispanic American Historical Review 58(3), 1978, 451-459.

Only rarely do we hear about a Negro slave who achieved distinction... Two examples... are Juan Valiente, the conquistador of Chile, and Yanga, the famed Maroom leader in Veracruz.

Although most blacks who came to America in early years were slaves, records of the Casa de Contractión showed that a good many freed black freedmen from Seville and elsewhere found passage on westward-bound ships. Some... settled in the Carribbean... others... to Mexico and Peru, identifying... as Catholic subjects of a Spanish king, with much the same privileges and ambitions as white Spaniards. "Benito el Negro" and "Juan el Negro" (...[i.e.,] Juan de Villanueva) were encomenderos in the province of Pánuco and thus... should not have been slaves...

[T]here is a record of an African who apparently crossed the Atlantic as a freeman, participated in the siege of Tenochtitlon and, in subsequent conquests and explorations, ...[was] an entrepreneur (with... Negro and Indian slaves...) in the ...search for gold, and... [was] a citizen in the Spanish quarter of Mexico city. His name... Juan Garrido...

The Diccionario Porrúa, perhaps relying on... Bernal Díaz, says that he arrived with Juan Núñez Sedeño, who accompanied Cortés' 1519 expedition in his... ship... that included "un negro"; Manuel Orozco y Berra has him crossing... with the army of Pánfilo de Narváez. Magnus Mörner... claiming ... "many" hispanicized and Spanish-speaking blacks took part in the conquest... without details...
- Ref: Magnus Mörner, La corona española y los foráneos en los pueblos de indios de América (Stockholm, 1970), p. 94.

His name appears... in the proceedings of Mexico city's cabildo... 1524 when that body granted... land... "...just past the chapel of Juan Garrido." Lucas Alamán identifies this as the church subsequently rebuilt... occupying the site where... Cortés' men died as they fled from Tenochtitlan on the Noche Triste.

Garrido took part in at least one of expeditions sent out by Cortés after the conquest of the Triple Alliance to secure control and investigate the exonomic potential of outlying areas.

Garrido became the first wheat farmer on the American continent. ...According to ...Andrés de Tapia, "...they brought [Cortés] a small amount of rice, and in it were three grains of wheat; he ordered a free Negro to plant them." ...Gil Conzáles Dávila [identified him] as "Juan Garrrido, a servant [criado] of Hernando Cortés."

By... 1528, he had acquired on credit... slaves and mining equipment and reported to be in... Zacatula... The gold rush was at its peak but Garrido does not seem to have enjoyed... success...

Cortés... heard that... [one] of his vessels had discovered an "island"... [which] was in fact... the southern tip of Southern California. ...By the time he reached Chametla... the... marquis was accompanied by a... retinue which apparently included Juan Garrido... in a privileged category... [with] his own complement of Negro and Indian slaves... Cortés... returned to Mexico... 1536, accompanied by... some of the colonists including Juan Garrido...

Russia and the Negro (1986)

: Blacks in Russian history and thought by Allison Blakely

[T]he present study poses the question of whether the Negro experience of Russian society can be instructive for a better understanding of the Negro experience within the major Western societies. ...For the general subject of Negro history, the main contribution of the present study is... offering additional knowledge about a peripheral area of what has been termed the "black diaspora."
- Preface

The term "Negro"... here denotes only people of primarily African descent. ...[T]hat would include Alexander Pushkin and... Alexandre Dumas père (who traveled extensively through Russia in 1858 and 1859 and left a detailed account). ...Pushkin's maternal great-grandfather and Dumas's paternal grandmother were Negroes; the two writers were not. Nevertheless, attitudes that Pushkin and other Russians have expressed concerning his African heritage do figure prominently in the present work.

The question of the earliest presence on Negroes in the geographical region which became the Russian empire centers on the origins of the small scattered settlements of Negroes... until recently... along the western slope of the Caucasus mountains near the Black Sea. ...[A] persistent line of thought ...places the advent of the Negroes in the area ...perhaps even in antiquity. This... was first raised by E. Lavrov in a letter to Kavkaz in 1913. ...[H]e pointed out that this was the area the ancient Greeks called Colchis, mentioned in their poetry ...eighth century B.C. ...Herodotus (484?-425? B.C) ...described the Colchians as black-skinned with wooly hair. This led him to believe that they were of Egyptian origin, perhaps of the army of the legendary Egyptian Emperor Sesostris

[A]n 1884 compilation of classical writings... grown out of an archeological congress... Tiflis in 1881... mentions Pindar... who refers to the Argonauts going to the river Phasis, where Aieta attacked the dark-skinned Colchians. ...[T]he compiler ...concludes that the Laz people of Abkhazia had formerly been called Colchians. While admitting ...gaps in the evidence, the compiler cites a number of Greek writers, including Procopius, to support this contention.
- Ref: Patrick English, "Cushites, Colchians, and Khazars," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 18 (1959): 49-53. See also Frank M. Snowden Jr., Blacks in Antiquity (1970) p. 270; and W.E.D. Allen & Paul Muratoff, Caucasian Battlefields (1953)

Patrick English... marshals... data to support... the hypothesis that the Abkhazian Negroes' lineage may extend... to ancient times... He notes Herodotus'... attention... in distinguishing between Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Colchians... observing that the Colchians wove linen like the Egyptians and... no one else. ...English questions the likelihood that slaves would be imported to an area... famous for the export of slaves from its local population. ...English relies upon... the Iliad, the Bible, and... writings of the Church Fathers. He... posits a possible link between the Abkhazian Negroes and the creation of the Khazar empire.

Lia Golden-Hanga... notes that the tsarist officials frequently listed the Negroes as Arabs and Jews.

Slava Tynes... discusses the work of Dmitri Gulia... who believed the Colchians had "Abyssino-Egyptian" origins. ...Gulia showed the similarities between many Abkhazian and Egyptian geographical names, those of deities and families... manners and customs.

European Dimensions of the African Diaspora (1999)

: The Definition of Black Racial Identity, by Allison Blakely in Crossing Boundaries: Comparative History of Black People in Diaspora (1999) ed., Darlene Clark Hine, Jacqueline McLeod.

Blacks were in Spain and Portugal in high numbers in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, with many assimilated into the population. The first Africans who went to the Americas were from Europe, not Africa. ...Blacks were not just subordinate, passive pawns in these developments: they participated as rulers, merchants, seamen, soldiers, and free laborers, as well as slaves.

[I]n the twelfth-century German version of the "Song of Roland," the epic tale based on the clashes between Christian and Moslem armies in the eighth century, one of the Moslem leaders is described as... "He was black and ugly, the people [in his country] are wild, the sun never shines there, the devils feel at home there."

Wolfram von Eschenbach's "Parzival," which was drawn from the legend of King Arthur... in the thirteenth century and evolved for centuries om England, France, Germany and the Netherlands... repeated the theme of black skin color as fearsome, but implied that Blacks could become enobled by racial mixing with whites and through Christianization.

Hume's and Kant's denial of any significant achievements by blacks ignored prominent nearby examples in Europe, such as Frances Williams, a Jamaican classicist who had excelled as a student at Cambridge and whose career was familiar to Hume. Among those less known were three closer to Kant's home... Jacobus Capitein, who through his accomplishments in Holland had in 1742 become the first black minister of any Protestant church. ...[T]he West India Company and the Church would not condone his marrying an African woman, choosing... to provide him a Dutch bride... from Rotterdam. ...Anthony William Amo ...born on the Gold Coast, around 1700 ...The West India Company brought him to Amsterdam ...and presented him to the Duke of Wolfenbüttel. He was baptized... in 1707 ...[H]e was able to enter the Universities of Halle in 1727 and Wittenberg in 1730, where he became skilled in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, German, and Dutch and concentrated on philosophy. ...In 1734 he was awarded a doctorate... In his philosophical work he... devoted... attention to mathematical and medical knowledge in the context of Enlightenment thought. He became a lecturer at the University of Halle and later at the University of Jena. ...[I]n Russia ...Peter the Great ...became the godfather of one of his black servant boys and provided him with the best possible education. ...Abraham Hannibal ...was ...sent to France for ...higher education in mathematics and military engineering. This adventure would... provide the... plot for a short story by his great-grandson, Alexander Pushkin. Hannibal... attained the rank of major general and... served as commandant of the city of Reval... [and] later direct major canal construction projects...

The Black Presence in Pre-20th Century Europe (2008)

: A Hidden History by Allison Blakely

Africa and Africans have had an influence on European thought and culture far disproportionate to the size of the small black population (which... approached 150,000 in the [16th century] Iberian peninsula... and by the 18th Century... several thousand in France, a few thousand in the Netherlands, and several hundred... through Germany, Scandinavia, and Russia.

[P]ersons of African ancestry... achieved distinction in Moorish Iberia and later in Spain and Portugal, the European societies that first saw a large influx of blacks. Most... were mulattos... Cristóbol de Meneses, a Dominican priest; the painters Juan de Pareja and Sebastian Gomez; and Leonardo Ortiz, a lawyer. ...In 1306 an Ethiopian delegation came to Europe to seek an alliance with the "King of the Spains" against the Moslems. King Anfós IV of Aragon considered arranging a double marriage with the Negus of Ethiopia in 1428. And the Portuguese sent Pedro de Corvilhao to Ethiopia in 1487 on a similar mission.

[L]iving experience of blacks in Europe appeared to be marked by smooth integration into European society... The 140,000 slaves imported into Europe from Africa between 1450 and 1505 were a welcome new labor force in the wake of the Bubonic Plague. On the whole, blacks in Christian Iberia were not limited to servile roles; but... were... not influential as a group. ...Free blacks living in Loulé and Lagos in the southern edge of Portugal owned houses and worked as day laborers, midwives, bakers, and servants. Most were domestic servants, laborers (including those on ships and river craft), and petty tradesmen. Some free blacks, especially women, became innkeepers. Blacks in Spain served as stevedores, factory workers, farm laborers, footmen, coachmen, and butlers. ...A few Africans active in the Americas during the early Iberian expansion were among returnees to Portugal and Spain from America and Africa from the 16th to the 18th centuries. These included free mulatto students, clerics, free and slave household servants, sailors, and some who attained gentlemen’s status. ...[M]any black women slaves as domestics and concubines led to mulatto offspring who received favored treatment, and ...some ...attained middle-class and even aristocratic status.

[L]ater... in the northern, central, and eastern European societies... with smaller populations... it became fashionable... to employ blacks as house servants and in ceremonial roles such as military musicians.

Black saints were proclaimed in parts of medieval Europe when the Holy Roman Emperors, beginning with Charles IV... 1346, adopted blacks into the iconography... The statue of St. Maurice in the chapel of St. Kilian at Magdeburg and the 17th-century bust of St. Gregory the Moor at the church of St. Gereon in Cologne testify...

Los conquistadores españoles de ‘raza’ negra (2016)

by Jorge Álvarez, LBV Magazine Cultural Independiente, La Brújula Verde @labrujulaverde.com Creative Commons License 4.0 (Translation via Google Translate).

There were... protagonists of black 'race' in the conquest of America and some... stood out enough to improve their social standing and even to have left their names for posterity.

Manumission was not rare and many achieved it, establishing themselves as colonists with typical jobs as peculiar as doorman (the most common, in addition to guarding the door, he also called the councillors to meetings), town crier, auctioneer, executioner or... bagpiper. But some preferred to take the risk and enlist in the conquering forces.

Juan Valiente
Possibly the most famous black conquistador... he was... a slave when in 1533 he asked his master, Alonso Valiente, a landowner from Puebla (Mexico), for permission to go on a four-year journey in search of fortune with the promise of returning and paying for his freedom with the profits... The Spaniard agreed and Juan enlisted... with two hundred other Africans (most of them slaves) in the expedition [to Peru] that Hernán Cortés' former lieutenant, Pedro de Alvarado, was preparing... Once at his destination... there was no opportunity because Pizarro had gone ahead. Diego de Almagro paid Alvarado... in exchange for his leaving... hiring the men who wanted to stay. Juan Valiente was one of them and in 1535 he was in Chile with... [the] new leader, fighting against the Araucanians. Five years later he had managed to rise to captain and amass some capital, including an encomienda and a property on the outskirts of Santiago, as well as a wife, Juana de Valdivia, an alleged former slave of... the famous conquistador. ...[H]e died in combat, along with Valdivia himself, in the battle of Tucapel (1553).

Juan Garrido
[A] parallel life, enslaved by the Portuguese but converted to Christianity in Lisbon... allowed him to acquire freedom and travel to Seville, where he embarked in 1503 for Santo Domingo as a servant under... Pedro Garrido. ...[H]e fought [for eleven years] in the conquest of Cuba and Puerto Rico, as well as participating in the discovery of Florida. In 1519 he joined Cortés' expedition to Mexico... [I]n a letter to the King he boasted of having been the one who introduced the cultivation of wheat in those parts.
He later returned to military life, during Antonio de Carvajal's incursion [under Guzmán's command] into Michoacán and Zacatula. In 1525 he was granted a property in the new Mexico City, where he worked as a doorman, town crier and guard of the Chapultepec aqueduct... three years later... leading an expedition to exploit the gold mines of Zacatula.
After another break, he enlisted under Cortés when he explored Baja California; he was responsible for—and co-owner of—a battalion of black and indigenous slaves. He died in 1547, leaving behind a wife and three children.

Juan Beltrán
This mulatto became famous in the Chilean wars, where for his brave actions and his collaboration in the founding of the city of Villarrica he was entrusted with the construction and position of captain of a fort on the outskirts, in addition to... a commission of half a thousand Indians.
Beltrán led several victorious malocas (...raids in the language of overseas soldiers), but... died fighting against the indomitable Araucanians.

Juan García
Another mulatto... born free in Extremadura around 1495. He was part of Pizarro's expedition to Peru, travelling with his wife and daughters. He was a town crier and bagpiper, his main mission being to weigh the precious metals collected in Cajamarca for the ransom of Atahualpa.
He was also present at the successive distributions of gold and silver among the troops. ...[W]ith his earnings he bought an indigenous slave from another soldier and with her he had an illegitimate daughter.
He lived in Cuzco, where he [participated] in its urban reform... then moved to Lima with the idea of returning to Spain. He did so in 1536, triumphantly, settling in the area where he was born and adopting the name of Juan García Pizarro.

Other black conquerors
The list of black conquerors in America is... [e]ndless... except that we lack sufficient data about their lives. ...Juan Bardales, an African slave ...participated in the expeditions to Panama and Honduras (where he said he received a hundred arrow wounds), obtaining his manumission and a pension of fifty pesos granted by the King. ...Sebastián Toral ... for his work in the exploration of Yucatán achieved freedom, tax exemption and... [a] royal pension, working as a porter. ...Antonio Pérez ...was free and participated with Diego de Losada in the conquest of Caracas, where he rose to captain. ...Miguel Ruiz ...was with Pizarro in Cajamarca and obtained his share of the loot. ...Gómez de León ...received an encomienda in Chile.

[T]housands of people of colour... were omitted by the chroniclers (although Cieza de León usually mentions them generically), such as the two hundred who helped put out the fire in Cuzco during the siege of Manco Inca in 1536 or the similar number sent from Hispaniola as armed reinforcements; or those who collaborated in the conquest of New Granada, of whom only the identity of a mulatto called Pedro de Lerma has been revealed.

Black Faces of Tudor England (2017)

: From the court musician who persuaded Henry VIII to give him a handsome pay rise, to the family man who profited from high society’s passion for silk stockings, Miranda Kaufmann profiles six Africans who called England home in the 16th and 17th centuries, by Miranda Kaufmann, BBC History Magazine (December 1, 2017) @historyextra.com

Henry VIII’s "black trumpet"

The Tudor king lavished gifts on his long-serving musician, John Blanke

Scores of black men and women set up home in England as early as the 16th century—many arriving from Iberia, as the Spanish and Portuguese laid claim to swathes of Africa.

John Blanke... in the Westminster Roll of 1511, sound[s] his trumpet at the festivities marking the birth of a... son to Henry VIII and... Catherine of Aragon.

Blanke... performed at Henry VII’s funeral and... coronation (...1509) ...

Blanke—like all Africans in England—was a free man.

He received... twice... [what] most servants would... earn... before successfully petitioning... for a pay rise, doubling his wages...

The Landowner’s Enforcer

Edward Swarthye's role in a vicious family feud landed him in court

In 1596, a black man... Edward Swarthye whipped John Guye... future first governor of Newfoundland. They were both servants... of Sir Edward Wynter...

It was... that such a high-status, educated servant as John Guye had been publicly humiliated that upset... onlookers, not the colour of Swarthye’s skin.

Swarthye... [was] one of many Africans who fled their Spanish enslavers to join the English.

The fact that Swarthye was allowed to testify in court demonstrates that he was... a free man... Swarthye’s testimony was taken by the Court... without demur.

Silk Weaver

Reasonable Blackman made a good living from a booming new industry

Reasonable Blackman was a silk weaver... probably... from Antwerp... which had a sizeable African population and was a... centre for cloth manufacture.

Around 50,000 refugees fled to England from the southern Netherlands between 1550 and 1585, as war raged between Dutch rebels and Spanish forces occupying their country.

Blackman had a family of at least three children... Edward, Edmund and Jane... we can assume he was married... As with John Blanke’s wife... she was probably an Englishwoman.

[I]n... 1592... his daughter... and one of his sons, Edmund, died of the plague that struck London...

1614... "Edward Blakemore of Mile End, silkweaver" was married in Stepney.

A Single Woman in Rural England

Cattelena of Almondsbury sold butter and milk from her most prized possession, a cow

Cattelena’s possessions... each tell us something of her life. But the fact that she had them... tells us..l. Africans in England were not owned, but themselves possessed property.

Juan Valiente: From Slave to Spanish Conquistador, Captain and Encomienda-holder (2019 )

Editorial team, Think Africa @ThinkAfrica.net

The role of people of African descent in the colonization of Latin America... is a pivotal one. Starting from the earliest Spanish activity in the New World, Africans were present both as involuntary settlers and as voluntary conquistadors. The acquisition of status and privilege by African officers... reflected the active role of leadership played by these men...

[U]nlike Juan Garrido who most probably travelled to Portugal on his own, Juan Valiente was enslaved... acquired... by the Portuguese... and... sent... to Mexico. In Mexico City, he was purchased by Alonso Valiente... a cousin of Hernan Cortes. ...[H]e was baptized and given the name "Juan Valiente" and accompanied Alonso Valiente as a servant back to Spain.

[H]e signed a contract that allowed him to work for others as a conquistador... after four years, he was to return... and pay... Alonso... to gain his freedom. It was a time where a large number of Africans were sweeping through Latin America, the Caribbean and South America under different captains and commanders.

While Juan Valiente is the most famous of African Conquistadors in Chile, he wasn't the only African Conquistador... but... one among many... sixteenth-century armed African-born or Spanish-born free Africans and servants who actively participated in the... expeditions and conquests... Juan Garrido... participated in the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1521. Other African conquistadors... include Sebastián Toral in Mexico, Juan Beltrán in Chile, Estevanico in Florida, Pedro Fulupo in Costa Rica, and Juan Bardales in Honduras and Panama. For participating in these expeditions, most enslaved men gained their freedom while others who joined in as free men were awarded minor posts in their new homelands.

Many sources promote the idea that Africans who went to the New World were only mass slaves who were forcefully sent... to work... on plantations. The conquistadors’ names formerly mentioned and the accounts of how they were compensated... including money, land and slaves... demolishes this idea and shows instead that Africans... were... a great asset and played a vital role throughout the... Spanish expansion.

The Rarely Depicted Presence of Black/African People in European History (2021)

—Black History Month, by Melissa Simon-Hartman @Simon-Hartman.com

There were black/African people in pre-modern Europe during the Medieval and Tudor times! ...Some were affluent members of the society, iconic fictional characters, revered Saints, and... Knights.

[P]re-modern Europe was more diverse than most of us have been led to assume.

[P]eople of African descent were a part of the Tudor society... accepted and given the same rights as anyone else.

While John Blanke is... the most well-known Black Tudor... Others include Jacques Francis (a salvage diver), Diego (a circumnavigator), Mary Fillis (a servant), Dederi Jaquoah, (a prince and a merchant), Anne Cobbie (prostitute), Edward Swarthye (porter), Reasonable Blackman (silk weaver), and Cattelena of Almondsbury (an independent single woman).

"I Was Not Born to Obey, but Rather to Command" (2021)

: The Self-Fashioning of Ṣägga Krǝstos, an Ethiopian Traveler in Seventeenth-Century Europe by Matteo Salvadore, Journal of Early Modern History (2021) 1-33.

In 1632, an Ethiopian traveler named Ṣägga Krǝstos arrived in Cairo and introduced himself to Franciscan missionaries as the legitimate heir to the Ethiopian throne. Following conversion to Catholicism, he embarked on an epic journey throughout the Italian peninsula and France, where he was hosted and supported by the Congregation of Propaganda Fide, multiple northern Italian rulers, and the French monarchy. Ṣägga Krǝstos was an impostor, but... thanks to... skilled self-fashioning, he was extensively supported by his... hosts.

March 10, 1632, an African youth knocked at the door of Cairo’s Venetian consulate, asking to be treated by its resident physician... [H]e introduced himself as Ṣägga Krǝstos... son of the slain Ethiopian Emperor Yaʿǝqob... and told of his escape... after... Catholic Emperor Susǝnyos... killed his father. The story intrigued Paolo da Lodi... prefect of the Franciscan mission in Egypt since 1630... aware of the religious and political turmoil... Father Paolo saw the young Ethiopian as a valuable asset... Ṣägga Krǝstos visited Jerusalem, converted to Catholicism, then traveled to Rome, where Propaganda Fide vetted him in anticipation of his return to Ethiopia at the helm of a Franciscan mission. Instead, he would spend the rest of his life in Europe, as a guest of multiple courts, until his death in 1638 at Cardinal Richelieu’s mansion in Ruel.

Early Puebla and the Question of Labor, 1531–1570 (2018)

by Pablo Miguel Sierra Silva, Urban Slavery in Colonial Mexico: Puebla de los Ángeles, 1531–1706 pp. 21-44.

The first municipal reference to a free black man dates from 1539, when the municipal council acknowledged "Juan de Ordáz, negro" as a vecino, a title... with... civic rights. Acquiring vecindad, the status and privileges of formally acknowledged residency, carried great significance... [V]ecinos could petition the council for plots... to erect... residences or cultivate orchards.... what Juan de Ordáz did. He... twice in the historical record... selling the urban plots... he had been granted... In 1546, Francisco Díaz, a black freedman, was also included on the city’s list of registered residents. Two other black men, Juan de Montalvo and Diego Monte, had their vecindad[s]... in 1550 and 1571, respectively.

What... allowed these men... vecino status? ...freedom and a wife. Ordáz received a 200-peso dowry from his wife, Catalina Díaz. Montalvo... Puebla’s towncrier... [b]y 1555... had... enough money to send... Pedro de Padilla... to Guatemala... to bring his wife back... Montalvo’s standing as a free black vecino with connections to elite Poblanos distinguished him in a city where the overwhelming majority of people of African descent were enslaved.

Other notable black men undoubtedly spent time in Puebla... but Pedro López de Villaseñor’s listing suggests... few were able to claim vecindad.[T]he black conquistador Juan Valiente was... [b]orn on the African mainland around 1505... purchased by Hernan Cortés's cousin and... conquistador, Alonso Valiente... [who] took Juan Valiente to Puebla... in 1532. ...In an emerging settlement defined for its anti-conquistador stance, it is not... clear that he benefited from his owner's social standing. ...Valiente asked his owner to grant him four years "to seek opportunity" as a conquistador in Pedro de Alvarado's expedition to Guatemala. ...By 1534 ...[he] had made his way to Guatemala and Northern Peru. He would fight for Diego de Almagro in Chile the following year. Over the next two decades, Juan Valiente received an estate near Santiago de Chile, married Juana de Valdivia, and... received an encomienda for his military feats.

Black Tudors and the Haberdashers' Company (2022)

by Dr David Bartle, company archivist, The Haberdashers' Company @haberdashers.co.uk

In her 2017 book Black Tudors: The Untold Story Miranda Kaufmann has written a seminal work...

Africans were already known to have been living in Roman Britain as soldiers, slaves or even free men and women. Kaufmann shows that, by Tudor times, some were... present at the royal courts... and ...in households of courtiers ...

William Shakespeare... wrote several black parts... two of his greatest characters are black... [T]hat he put them into mainstream entertainment reflects... that they were a significant element in the population of London.

[T]hey were employed... as domestic servants, professional businessmen, musicians, dancers and entertainers. ...[T]hey were not slaves.

[I]n Elizabeth's reign, the black people of London... were free; some... married native English people.

West African... Dederi Jaquoah... circumnavigated half the globe with Sir Francis Drake.

[I]n the reign of Queen Mary... 'there was a Negro made fine spanish needles in Cheapside but would never teach his Art to any'. ...'Spanish needles' ...fine sewing needles ...of steel, were new to England ...the black man in Cheapside ...first brought the art of steel needle-making to England.

Black Tudors were socially no worse off than white ones. ...[T]hey were acknowledged as citizens ...

External links

Wikipedia

Wikipedia has an article about:

African diaspora

BlackCentralEurope.com 1000 years of Black history in the German-speaking lands
- Gregory the Moor (Gregorius Maurus)
A Black Conquistador in Mexico by Peter Gerhard, Hispanic American Historical Review (1978) Vol. 58 No. 3, pp. 451–459.
Black Faces of Tudor England by Miranda Kaufmann, from court musician who persuaded Henry VIII to give him a handsome pay rise, to the family man who profited from high society’s passion for silk stockings...
BlackPast.org largest online encyclopedia on African American & Global African history
1 - Early Puebla and the Question of Labor, 1531–1570 by Pablo Miguel Sierra Silva, in Urban Slavery in Colonial Mexico: Puebla de los Ángeles, 1531–1706 (2018) @Cambridge University Press
Juan Valiente: From Slave to Spanish Conquistador, Captain and Encomienda-holder by editorial team @ThinkAfrica.net
Los conquistadores españoles de 'raza' negra by Jorge Álvarez
The Rarely Depicted Presence of Black/African People in European History - Black History Month (Oct 14, 2020) by Melissa Simon-Hartman @Simon-Hartman.com

Quotes

Juan Garrido, black in color... of his own free will, became a Christian in Lisbon, was in Castile for seven years, and crossed to Santo Domingo [for seven years]... From there he visited other islands then went to San Juan de Puerto Rico... [for] much time, [then]...came to New Spain. He was present at the taking of this city of Mexico and... other conquests, and later to the island with the marquis. He was the first to plant and harvest wheat in this land... and brought many vegetable seeds to New Spain.
- Juan Garrido (late 1540s) A short dictated Resume of his services to the crown, as translated by Peter Gerhard, A Black Conquistador in Mexico, Hispanic American Historical Review (1978) 58(3) pp. 451-459, referencing Icaza, Diccionario, no. 169. Epistolario de Nueva España, 1505-1818, recopilado por Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, 16 vols. (México, 1939-1942), Vol. 8-9. ...cf. Millares Carlo and Mantecón, Indice, II, no. 2647.

San Hipólito... one of the most interesting churches in the city. ...1520 ...the greatest slaughter of the Spaniards during the retreat of the memorable Noche Triste ...After the final conquest of the city, one of the survivors of that dismal night, Juan Garrido, having freshly in mind its bloody horrors, built of adobe at this place a little commemorative chapel.
- Thomas Allibone Janvier, The Mexican Guide (1890) 4th edition, pp. 206-7.

They lived in a world where skin colour was less important than religion, class or talent: before the English became heavily involved in the slave trade, and before they founded their first surviving colony in the Americas.
...Their stories challenge the traditional narrative that racial slavery was inevitable and that it was imported to colonial Virginia from Tudor England. They force us to re-examine the 17th century to find out what had caused perceptions to change so radically.
- Miranda Kaufmann, Black Tudors: The Untold Story (2017)

Juan Valiente (ca. 1505-1553) was probably born in West Africa and sold by slavers to Portuguese traders, who... sold him to... Alonso Valiente. ...[H]e was baptized ...and around 1530 ...arrived ...in Puebla, New Spain ...[as] a domestic servant. By 1533 he ...convinced ...Valiente to allow him to become a conquistador ...[H]e would ...record ...his earnings ...to return them to his owner. He went to Guatemala and joined Pedro de Alvarado's expedition to Peru... [which was bought out by] Diego de Almagro... By 1535 he was in Chile fighting the Araucanians with Almagro, became a captain by 1540, and was rewarded with an estancia near Santiago in 1546 and an encomienda in 1550. ...[H]e was killed by Araucanian Indians at the battle of Tucapel in 1553.
- Juan Valiente, "Unhorsed" Chiricu (2019) vol. 4, no. 1, fall 2019, p. 160.

A Black Conquistador in Mexico (1978)

by Peter Gerhard, Hispanic American Historical Review 58(3), 1978, 451-459.

Only rarely do we hear about a Negro slave who achieved distinction... Two examples... are Juan Valiente, the conquistador of Chile, and Yanga, the famed Maroom leader in Veracruz.

Although most blacks who came to America in early years were slaves, records of the Casa de Contractión showed that a good many freed black freedmen from Seville and elsewhere found passage on westward-bound ships. Some... settled in the Carribbean... others... to Mexico and Peru, identifying... as Catholic subjects of a Spanish king, with much the same privileges and ambitions as white Spaniards. "Benito el Negro" and "Juan el Negro" (...[i.e.,] Juan de Villanueva) were encomenderos in the province of Pánuco and thus... should not have been slaves...

[T]here is a record of an African who apparently crossed the Atlantic as a freeman, participated in the siege of Tenochtitlon and, in subsequent conquests and explorations, ...[was] an entrepreneur (with... Negro and Indian slaves...) in the ...search for gold, and... [was] a citizen in the Spanish quarter of Mexico city. His name... Juan Garrido...

The Diccionario Porrúa, perhaps relying on... Bernal Díaz, says that he arrived with Juan Núñez Sedeño, who accompanied Cortés' 1519 expedition in his... ship... that included "un negro"; Manuel Orozco y Berra has him crossing... with the army of Pánfilo de Narváez. Magnus Mörner... claiming ... "many" hispanicized and Spanish-speaking blacks took part in the conquest... without details...
- Ref: Magnus Mörner, La corona española y los foráneos en los pueblos de indios de América (Stockholm, 1970), p. 94.

His name appears... in the proceedings of Mexico city's cabildo... 1524 when that body granted... land... "...just past the chapel of Juan Garrido." Lucas Alamán identifies this as the church subsequently rebuilt... occupying the site where... Cortés' men died as they fled from Tenochtitlan on the Noche Triste.

Garrido took part in at least one of expeditions sent out by Cortés after the conquest of the Triple Alliance to secure control and investigate the exonomic potential of outlying areas.

Garrido became the first wheat farmer on the American continent. ...According to ...Andrés de Tapia, "...they brought [Cortés] a small amount of rice, and in it were three grains of wheat; he ordered a free Negro to plant them." ...Gil Conzáles Dávila [identified him] as "Juan Garrrido, a servant [criado] of Hernando Cortés."

By... 1528, he had acquired on credit... slaves and mining equipment and reported to be in... Zacatula... The gold rush was at its peak but Garrido does not seem to have enjoyed... success...

Cortés... heard that... [one] of his vessels had discovered an "island"... [which] was in fact... the southern tip of Southern California. ...By the time he reached Chametla... the... marquis was accompanied by a... retinue which apparently included Juan Garrido... in a privileged category... [with] his own complement of Negro and Indian slaves... Cortés... returned to Mexico... 1536, accompanied by... some of the colonists including Juan Garrido...

Russia and the Negro (1986)

: Blacks in Russian history and thought by Allison Blakely

[T]he present study poses the question of whether the Negro experience of Russian society can be instructive for a better understanding of the Negro experience within the major Western societies. ...For the general subject of Negro history, the main contribution of the present study is... offering additional knowledge about a peripheral area of what has been termed the "black diaspora."
- Preface

The term "Negro"... here denotes only people of primarily African descent. ...[T]hat would include Alexander Pushkin and... Alexandre Dumas père (who traveled extensively through Russia in 1858 and 1859 and left a detailed account). ...Pushkin's maternal great-grandfather and Dumas's paternal grandmother were Negroes; the two writers were not. Nevertheless, attitudes that Pushkin and other Russians have expressed concerning his African heritage do figure prominently in the present work.

The question of the earliest presence on Negroes in the geographical region which became the Russian empire centers on the origins of the small scattered settlements of Negroes... until recently... along the western slope of the Caucasus mountains near the Black Sea. ...[A] persistent line of thought ...places the advent of the Negroes in the area ...perhaps even in antiquity. This... was first raised by E. Lavrov in a letter to Kavkaz in 1913. ...[H]e pointed out that this was the area the ancient Greeks called Colchis, mentioned in their poetry ...eighth century B.C. ...Herodotus (484?-425? B.C) ...described the Colchians as black-skinned with wooly hair. This led him to believe that they were of Egyptian origin, perhaps of the army of the legendary Egyptian Emperor Sesostris

[A]n 1884 compilation of classical writings... grown out of an archeological congress... Tiflis in 1881... mentions Pindar... who refers to the Argonauts going to the river Phasis, where Aieta attacked the dark-skinned Colchians. ...[T]he compiler ...concludes that the Laz people of Abkhazia had formerly been called Colchians. While admitting ...gaps in the evidence, the compiler cites a number of Greek writers, including Procopius, to support this contention.
- Ref: Patrick English, "Cushites, Colchians, and Khazars," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 18 (1959): 49-53. See also Frank M. Snowden Jr., Blacks in Antiquity (1970) p. 270; and W.E.D. Allen & Paul Muratoff, Caucasian Battlefields (1953)

Patrick English... marshals... data to support... the hypothesis that the Abkhazian Negroes' lineage may extend... to ancient times... He notes Herodotus'... attention... in distinguishing between Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Colchians... observing that the Colchians wove linen like the Egyptians and... no one else. ...English questions the likelihood that slaves would be imported to an area... famous for the export of slaves from its local population. ...English relies upon... the Iliad, the Bible, and... writings of the Church Fathers. He... posits a possible link between the Abkhazian Negroes and the creation of the Khazar empire.

Lia Golden-Hanga... notes that the tsarist officials frequently listed the Negroes as Arabs and Jews.

Slava Tynes... discusses the work of Dmitri Gulia... who believed the Colchians had "Abyssino-Egyptian" origins. ...Gulia showed the similarities between many Abkhazian and Egyptian geographical names, those of deities and families... manners and customs.

European Dimensions of the African Diaspora (1999)

: The Definition of Black Racial Identity, by Allison Blakely in Crossing Boundaries: Comparative History of Black People in Diaspora (1999) ed., Darlene Clark Hine, Jacqueline McLeod.

Blacks were in Spain and Portugal in high numbers in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, with many assimilated into the population. The first Africans who went to the Americas were from Europe, not Africa. ...Blacks were not just subordinate, passive pawns in these developments: they participated as rulers, merchants, seamen, soldiers, and free laborers, as well as slaves.

[I]n the twelfth-century German version of the "Song of Roland," the epic tale based on the clashes between Christian and Moslem armies in the eighth century, one of the Moslem leaders is described as... "He was black and ugly, the people [in his country] are wild, the sun never shines there, the devils feel at home there."

Wolfram von Eschenbach's "Parzival," which was drawn from the legend of King Arthur... in the thirteenth century and evolved for centuries om England, France, Germany and the Netherlands... repeated the theme of black skin color as fearsome, but implied that Blacks could become enobled by racial mixing with whites and through Christianization.

Hume's and Kant's denial of any significant achievements by blacks ignored prominent nearby examples in Europe, such as Frances Williams, a Jamaican classicist who had excelled as a student at Cambridge and whose career was familiar to Hume. Among those less known were three closer to Kant's home... Jacobus Capitein, who through his accomplishments in Holland had in 1742 become the first black minister of any Protestant church. ...[T]he West India Company and the Church would not condone his marrying an African woman, choosing... to provide him a Dutch bride... from Rotterdam. ...Anthony William Amo ...born on the Gold Coast, around 1700 ...The West India Company brought him to Amsterdam ...and presented him to the Duke of Wolfenbüttel. He was baptized... in 1707 ...[H]e was able to enter the Universities of Halle in 1727 and Wittenberg in 1730, where he became skilled in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, German, and Dutch and concentrated on philosophy. ...In 1734 he was awarded a doctorate... In his philosophical work he... devoted... attention to mathematical and medical knowledge in the context of Enlightenment thought. He became a lecturer at the University of Halle and later at the University of Jena. ...[I]n Russia ...Peter the Great ...became the godfather of one of his black servant boys and provided him with the best possible education. ...Abraham Hannibal ...was ...sent to France for ...higher education in mathematics and military engineering. This adventure would... provide the... plot for a short story by his great-grandson, Alexander Pushkin. Hannibal... attained the rank of major general and... served as commandant of the city of Reval... [and] later direct major canal construction projects...

The Black Presence in Pre-20th Century Europe (2008)

: A Hidden History by Allison Blakely

Africa and Africans have had an influence on European thought and culture far disproportionate to the size of the small black population (which... approached 150,000 in the [16th century] Iberian peninsula... and by the 18th Century... several thousand in France, a few thousand in the Netherlands, and several hundred... through Germany, Scandinavia, and Russia.

[P]ersons of African ancestry... achieved distinction in Moorish Iberia and later in Spain and Portugal, the European societies that first saw a large influx of blacks. Most... were mulattos... Cristóbol de Meneses, a Dominican priest; the painters Juan de Pareja and Sebastian Gomez; and Leonardo Ortiz, a lawyer. ...In 1306 an Ethiopian delegation came to Europe to seek an alliance with the "King of the Spains" against the Moslems. King Anfós IV of Aragon considered arranging a double marriage with the Negus of Ethiopia in 1428. And the Portuguese sent Pedro de Corvilhao to Ethiopia in 1487 on a similar mission.

[L]iving experience of blacks in Europe appeared to be marked by smooth integration into European society... The 140,000 slaves imported into Europe from Africa between 1450 and 1505 were a welcome new labor force in the wake of the Bubonic Plague. On the whole, blacks in Christian Iberia were not limited to servile roles; but... were... not influential as a group. ...Free blacks living in Loulé and Lagos in the southern edge of Portugal owned houses and worked as day laborers, midwives, bakers, and servants. Most were domestic servants, laborers (including those on ships and river craft), and petty tradesmen. Some free blacks, especially women, became innkeepers. Blacks in Spain served as stevedores, factory workers, farm laborers, footmen, coachmen, and butlers. ...A few Africans active in the Americas during the early Iberian expansion were among returnees to Portugal and Spain from America and Africa from the 16th to the 18th centuries. These included free mulatto students, clerics, free and slave household servants, sailors, and some who attained gentlemen’s status. ...[M]any black women slaves as domestics and concubines led to mulatto offspring who received favored treatment, and ...some ...attained middle-class and even aristocratic status.

[L]ater... in the northern, central, and eastern European societies... with smaller populations... it became fashionable... to employ blacks as house servants and in ceremonial roles such as military musicians.

Black saints were proclaimed in parts of medieval Europe when the Holy Roman Emperors, beginning with Charles IV... 1346, adopted blacks into the iconography... The statue of St. Maurice in the chapel of St. Kilian at Magdeburg and the 17th-century bust of St. Gregory the Moor at the church of St. Gereon in Cologne testify...

Los conquistadores españoles de ‘raza’ negra (2016)

by Jorge Álvarez, LBV Magazine Cultural Independiente, La Brújula Verde @labrujulaverde.com Creative Commons License 4.0 (Translation via Google Translate).

There were... protagonists of black 'race' in the conquest of America and some... stood out enough to improve their social standing and even to have left their names for posterity.

Manumission was not rare and many achieved it, establishing themselves as colonists with typical jobs as peculiar as doorman (the most common, in addition to guarding the door, he also called the councillors to meetings), town crier, auctioneer, executioner or... bagpiper. But some preferred to take the risk and enlist in the conquering forces.

Juan Valiente
Possibly the most famous black conquistador... he was... a slave when in 1533 he asked his master, Alonso Valiente, a landowner from Puebla (Mexico), for permission to go on a four-year journey in search of fortune with the promise of returning and paying for his freedom with the profits... The Spaniard agreed and Juan enlisted... with two hundred other Africans (most of them slaves) in the expedition [to Peru] that Hernán Cortés' former lieutenant, Pedro de Alvarado, was preparing... Once at his destination... there was no opportunity because Pizarro had gone ahead. Diego de Almagro paid Alvarado... in exchange for his leaving... hiring the men who wanted to stay. Juan Valiente was one of them and in 1535 he was in Chile with... [the] new leader, fighting against the Araucanians. Five years later he had managed to rise to captain and amass some capital, including an encomienda and a property on the outskirts of Santiago, as well as a wife, Juana de Valdivia, an alleged former slave of... the famous conquistador. ...[H]e died in combat, along with Valdivia himself, in the battle of Tucapel (1553).

Juan Garrido
[A] parallel life, enslaved by the Portuguese but converted to Christianity in Lisbon... allowed him to acquire freedom and travel to Seville, where he embarked in 1503 for Santo Domingo as a servant under... Pedro Garrido. ...[H]e fought [for eleven years] in the conquest of Cuba and Puerto Rico, as well as participating in the discovery of Florida. In 1519 he joined Cortés' expedition to Mexico... [I]n a letter to the King he boasted of having been the one who introduced the cultivation of wheat in those parts.
He later returned to military life, during Antonio de Carvajal's incursion [under Guzmán's command] into Michoacán and Zacatula. In 1525 he was granted a property in the new Mexico City, where he worked as a doorman, town crier and guard of the Chapultepec aqueduct... three years later... leading an expedition to exploit the gold mines of Zacatula.
After another break, he enlisted under Cortés when he explored Baja California; he was responsible for—and co-owner of—a battalion of black and indigenous slaves. He died in 1547, leaving behind a wife and three children.

Juan Beltrán
This mulatto became famous in the Chilean wars, where for his brave actions and his collaboration in the founding of the city of Villarrica he was entrusted with the construction and position of captain of a fort on the outskirts, in addition to... a commission of half a thousand Indians.
Beltrán led several victorious malocas (...raids in the language of overseas soldiers), but... died fighting against the indomitable Araucanians.

Juan García
Another mulatto... born free in Extremadura around 1495. He was part of Pizarro's expedition to Peru, travelling with his wife and daughters. He was a town crier and bagpiper, his main mission being to weigh the precious metals collected in Cajamarca for the ransom of Atahualpa.
He was also present at the successive distributions of gold and silver among the troops. ...[W]ith his earnings he bought an indigenous slave from another soldier and with her he had an illegitimate daughter.
He lived in Cuzco, where he [participated] in its urban reform... then moved to Lima with the idea of returning to Spain. He did so in 1536, triumphantly, settling in the area where he was born and adopting the name of Juan García Pizarro.

Other black conquerors
The list of black conquerors in America is... [e]ndless... except that we lack sufficient data about their lives. ...Juan Bardales, an African slave ...participated in the expeditions to Panama and Honduras (where he said he received a hundred arrow wounds), obtaining his manumission and a pension of fifty pesos granted by the King. ...Sebastián Toral ... for his work in the exploration of Yucatán achieved freedom, tax exemption and... [a] royal pension, working as a porter. ...Antonio Pérez ...was free and participated with Diego de Losada in the conquest of Caracas, where he rose to captain. ...Miguel Ruiz ...was with Pizarro in Cajamarca and obtained his share of the loot. ...Gómez de León ...received an encomienda in Chile.

[T]housands of people of colour... were omitted by the chroniclers (although Cieza de León usually mentions them generically), such as the two hundred who helped put out the fire in Cuzco during the siege of Manco Inca in 1536 or the similar number sent from Hispaniola as armed reinforcements; or those who collaborated in the conquest of New Granada, of whom only the identity of a mulatto called Pedro de Lerma has been revealed.

Black Faces of Tudor England (2017)

Henry VIII’s "black trumpet"

The Tudor king lavished gifts on his long-serving musician, John Blanke

Scores of black men and women set up home in England as early as the 16th century—many arriving from Iberia, as the Spanish and Portuguese laid claim to swathes of Africa.

John Blanke... in the Westminster Roll of 1511, sound[s] his trumpet at the festivities marking the birth of a... son to Henry VIII and... Catherine of Aragon.

Blanke... performed at Henry VII’s funeral and... coronation (...1509) ...

Blanke—like all Africans in England—was a free man.

He received... twice... [what] most servants would... earn... before successfully petitioning... for a pay rise, doubling his wages...

The Landowner’s Enforcer

Edward Swarthye's role in a vicious family feud landed him in court

In 1596, a black man... Edward Swarthye whipped John Guye... future first governor of Newfoundland. They were both servants... of Sir Edward Wynter...

It was... that such a high-status, educated servant as John Guye had been publicly humiliated that upset... onlookers, not the colour of Swarthye’s skin.

Swarthye... [was] one of many Africans who fled their Spanish enslavers to join the English.

The fact that Swarthye was allowed to testify in court demonstrates that he was... a free man... Swarthye’s testimony was taken by the Court... without demur.

Silk Weaver

Reasonable Blackman made a good living from a booming new industry

Reasonable Blackman was a silk weaver... probably... from Antwerp... which had a sizeable African population and was a... centre for cloth manufacture.

Around 50,000 refugees fled to England from the southern Netherlands between 1550 and 1585, as war raged between Dutch rebels and Spanish forces occupying their country.

Blackman had a family of at least three children... Edward, Edmund and Jane... we can assume he was married... As with John Blanke’s wife... she was probably an Englishwoman.

[I]n... 1592... his daughter... and one of his sons, Edmund, died of the plague that struck London...

1614... "Edward Blakemore of Mile End, silkweaver" was married in Stepney.

A Single Woman in Rural England

Cattelena of Almondsbury sold butter and milk from her most prized possession, a cow

Cattelena’s possessions... each tell us something of her life. But the fact that she had them... tells us..l. Africans in England were not owned, but themselves possessed property.

Juan Valiente: From Slave to Spanish Conquistador, Captain and Encomienda-holder (2019 )

Editorial team, Think Africa @ThinkAfrica.net

The role of people of African descent in the colonization of Latin America... is a pivotal one. Starting from the earliest Spanish activity in the New World, Africans were present both as involuntary settlers and as voluntary conquistadors. The acquisition of status and privilege by African officers... reflected the active role of leadership played by these men...

[U]nlike Juan Garrido who most probably travelled to Portugal on his own, Juan Valiente was enslaved... acquired... by the Portuguese... and... sent... to Mexico. In Mexico City, he was purchased by Alonso Valiente... a cousin of Hernan Cortes. ...[H]e was baptized and given the name "Juan Valiente" and accompanied Alonso Valiente as a servant back to Spain.

[H]e signed a contract that allowed him to work for others as a conquistador... after four years, he was to return... and pay... Alonso... to gain his freedom. It was a time where a large number of Africans were sweeping through Latin America, the Caribbean and South America under different captains and commanders.

While Juan Valiente is the most famous of African Conquistadors in Chile, he wasn't the only African Conquistador... but... one among many... sixteenth-century armed African-born or Spanish-born free Africans and servants who actively participated in the... expeditions and conquests... Juan Garrido... participated in the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1521. Other African conquistadors... include Sebastián Toral in Mexico, Juan Beltrán in Chile, Estevanico in Florida, Pedro Fulupo in Costa Rica, and Juan Bardales in Honduras and Panama. For participating in these expeditions, most enslaved men gained their freedom while others who joined in as free men were awarded minor posts in their new homelands.

Many sources promote the idea that Africans who went to the New World were only mass slaves who were forcefully sent... to work... on plantations. The conquistadors’ names formerly mentioned and the accounts of how they were compensated... including money, land and slaves... demolishes this idea and shows instead that Africans... were... a great asset and played a vital role throughout the... Spanish expansion.

The Rarely Depicted Presence of Black/African People in European History (2021)

—Black History Month, by Melissa Simon-Hartman @Simon-Hartman.com

There were black/African people in pre-modern Europe during the Medieval and Tudor times! ...Some were affluent members of the society, iconic fictional characters, revered Saints, and... Knights.

[P]re-modern Europe was more diverse than most of us have been led to assume.

[P]eople of African descent were a part of the Tudor society... accepted and given the same rights as anyone else.

While John Blanke is... the most well-known Black Tudor... Others include Jacques Francis (a salvage diver), Diego (a circumnavigator), Mary Fillis (a servant), Dederi Jaquoah, (a prince and a merchant), Anne Cobbie (prostitute), Edward Swarthye (porter), Reasonable Blackman (silk weaver), and Cattelena of Almondsbury (an independent single woman).

"I Was Not Born to Obey, but Rather to Command" (2021)

: The Self-Fashioning of Ṣägga Krǝstos, an Ethiopian Traveler in Seventeenth-Century Europe by Matteo Salvadore, Journal of Early Modern History (2021) 1-33.

In 1632, an Ethiopian traveler named Ṣägga Krǝstos arrived in Cairo and introduced himself to Franciscan missionaries as the legitimate heir to the Ethiopian throne. Following conversion to Catholicism, he embarked on an epic journey throughout the Italian peninsula and France, where he was hosted and supported by the Congregation of Propaganda Fide, multiple northern Italian rulers, and the French monarchy. Ṣägga Krǝstos was an impostor, but... thanks to... skilled self-fashioning, he was extensively supported by his... hosts.

March 10, 1632, an African youth knocked at the door of Cairo’s Venetian consulate, asking to be treated by its resident physician... [H]e introduced himself as Ṣägga Krǝstos... son of the slain Ethiopian Emperor Yaʿǝqob... and told of his escape... after... Catholic Emperor Susǝnyos... killed his father. The story intrigued Paolo da Lodi... prefect of the Franciscan mission in Egypt since 1630... aware of the religious and political turmoil... Father Paolo saw the young Ethiopian as a valuable asset... Ṣägga Krǝstos visited Jerusalem, converted to Catholicism, then traveled to Rome, where Propaganda Fide vetted him in anticipation of his return to Ethiopia at the helm of a Franciscan mission. Instead, he would spend the rest of his life in Europe, as a guest of multiple courts, until his death in 1638 at Cardinal Richelieu’s mansion in Ruel.

Early Puebla and the Question of Labor, 1531–1570 (2018)

by Pablo Miguel Sierra Silva, Urban Slavery in Colonial Mexico: Puebla de los Ángeles, 1531–1706 pp. 21-44.

The first municipal reference to a free black man dates from 1539, when the municipal council acknowledged "Juan de Ordáz, negro" as a vecino, a title... with... civic rights. Acquiring vecindad, the status and privileges of formally acknowledged residency, carried great significance... [V]ecinos could petition the council for plots... to erect... residences or cultivate orchards.... what Juan de Ordáz did. He... twice in the historical record... selling the urban plots... he had been granted... In 1546, Francisco Díaz, a black freedman, was also included on the city’s list of registered residents. Two other black men, Juan de Montalvo and Diego Monte, had their vecindad[s]... in 1550 and 1571, respectively.

What... allowed these men... vecino status? ...freedom and a wife. Ordáz received a 200-peso dowry from his wife, Catalina Díaz. Montalvo... Puebla’s towncrier... [b]y 1555... had... enough money to send... Pedro de Padilla... to Guatemala... to bring his wife back... Montalvo’s standing as a free black vecino with connections to elite Poblanos distinguished him in a city where the overwhelming majority of people of African descent were enslaved.

Other notable black men undoubtedly spent time in Puebla... but Pedro López de Villaseñor’s listing suggests... few were able to claim vecindad.[T]he black conquistador Juan Valiente was... [b]orn on the African mainland around 1505... purchased by Hernan Cortés's cousin and... conquistador, Alonso Valiente... [who] took Juan Valiente to Puebla... in 1532. ...In an emerging settlement defined for its anti-conquistador stance, it is not... clear that he benefited from his owner's social standing. ...Valiente asked his owner to grant him four years "to seek opportunity" as a conquistador in Pedro de Alvarado's expedition to Guatemala. ...By 1534 ...[he] had made his way to Guatemala and Northern Peru. He would fight for Diego de Almagro in Chile the following year. Over the next two decades, Juan Valiente received an estate near Santiago de Chile, married Juana de Valdivia, and... received an encomienda for his military feats.

Black Tudors and the Haberdashers' Company (2022)

by Dr David Bartle, company archivist, The Haberdashers' Company @haberdashers.co.uk

In her 2017 book Black Tudors: The Untold Story Miranda Kaufmann has written a seminal work...

Africans were already known to have been living in Roman Britain as soldiers, slaves or even free men and women. Kaufmann shows that, by Tudor times, some were... present at the royal courts... and ...in households of courtiers ...

William Shakespeare... wrote several black parts... two of his greatest characters are black... [T]hat he put them into mainstream entertainment reflects... that they were a significant element in the population of London.

[T]hey were employed... as domestic servants, professional businessmen, musicians, dancers and entertainers. ...[T]hey were not slaves.

[I]n Elizabeth's reign, the black people of London... were free; some... married native English people.

West African... Dederi Jaquoah... circumnavigated half the globe with Sir Francis Drake.

[I]n the reign of Queen Mary... 'there was a Negro made fine spanish needles in Cheapside but would never teach his Art to any'. ...'Spanish needles' ...fine sewing needles ...of steel, were new to England ...the black man in Cheapside ...first brought the art of steel needle-making to England.

Black Tudors were socially no worse off than white ones. ...[T]hey were acknowledged as citizens ...

External links

Wikipedia

Wikipedia has an article about:

African diaspora

BlackCentralEurope.com 1000 years of Black history in the German-speaking lands
- Gregory the Moor (Gregorius Maurus)
A Black Conquistador in Mexico by Peter Gerhard, Hispanic American Historical Review (1978) Vol. 58 No. 3, pp. 451–459.
Black Faces of Tudor England by Miranda Kaufmann, from court musician who persuaded Henry VIII to give him a handsome pay rise, to the family man who profited from high society’s passion for silk stockings...
BlackPast.org largest online encyclopedia on African American & Global African history
1 - Early Puebla and the Question of Labor, 1531–1570 by Pablo Miguel Sierra Silva, in Urban Slavery in Colonial Mexico: Puebla de los Ángeles, 1531–1706 (2018) @Cambridge University Press
Juan Valiente: From Slave to Spanish Conquistador, Captain and Encomienda-holder by editorial team @ThinkAfrica.net
Los conquistadores españoles de 'raza' negra by Jorge Álvarez
The Rarely Depicted Presence of Black/African People in European History - Black History Month (Oct 14, 2020) by Melissa Simon-Hartman @Simon-Hartman.com

History of Free African Diaspora

Quotes

A Black Conquistador in Mexico (1978)

Russia and the Negro (1986)

European Dimensions of the African Diaspora (1999)

The Black Presence in Pre-20th Century Europe (2008)

Los conquistadores españoles de ‘raza’ negra (2016)

Black Faces of Tudor England (2017)

Henry VIII’s "black trumpet"

The Landowner’s Enforcer

Silk Weaver

A Single Woman in Rural England

Juan Valiente: From Slave to Spanish Conquistador, Captain and Encomienda-holder (2019 )

The Rarely Depicted Presence of Black/African People in European History (2021)

"I Was Not Born to Obey, but Rather to Command" (2021)

Early Puebla and the Question of Labor, 1531–1570 (2018)

Black Tudors and the Haberdashers' Company (2022)

See also

External links

Wikiwand in your browser!

History of Free African Diaspora

Quotes

A Black Conquistador in Mexico (1978)

Russia and the Negro (1986)

European Dimensions of the African Diaspora (1999)

The Black Presence in Pre-20th Century Europe (2008)

Los conquistadores españoles de ‘raza’ negra (2016)

Black Faces of Tudor England (2017)

Henry VIII’s "black trumpet"

The Landowner’s Enforcer

Silk Weaver

A Single Woman in Rural England

Juan Valiente: From Slave to Spanish Conquistador, Captain and Encomienda-holder (2019 )

The Rarely Depicted Presence of Black/African People in European History (2021)

"I Was Not Born to Obey, but Rather to Command" (2021)

Early Puebla and the Question of Labor, 1531–1570 (2018)

Black Tudors and the Haberdashers' Company (2022)

See also

External links

Wikiwand in your browser!