Black British people
Black British people or Black Britons are a multi-ethnic group of British people who have ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa.
The term black has historically had a number of applications as a racial and political label. It may also be used in a wider sociopolitical context to encompass a broader range of non-European ethnic minority populations in Britain, though this usage has become less common over time. Black British is one of several self-designation entries used in official UK ethnicity classifications.
Around 3.7 per cent of the United Kingdom's population in 2021 were Black. The figures have increased from the 1991 census when 1.63 per cent of the population were recorded as Black or Black British to 1.15 million residents in 2001, or 2 per cent of the population, this further increased to just over 1.9 million in 2011, representing 3 per cent. Almost 96 per cent of Black Britons live in England, particularly in England's larger urban areas, with close to 1.2 million living in Greater London. 47.8% of the total Black British population live in London.
Terminology
The term Black British most commonly refers to Black people from the Commonwealth of Nations, such as from the British West Indies or British West Africa. In the 1970s, a time of rising activism against racial discrimination, the term Black was also applied to people from the Indian subcontinent. Black was used in this inclusive political sense to mean "non–white British". For example, Southall Black Sisters was established in 1979 "to meet the needs of black women". Several organisations continue to use the term inclusively, such as the Black Arts Alliance, who extend their use of the term to Latin Americans and all refugees, and the National Black Police Association.The official UK census has separate self-designation entries for respondents to identify as "Asian British", "Black British" and "Other ethnic group". Due to the Indian diaspora and in particular Idi Amin's expulsion of Asians from Uganda in 1972, many British Asians are from families that had previously lived for several generations in the British West Indies or the Comoros. A number of British Asians, including celebrities such as Riz Ahmed, still use the term "Black" and "Asian" interchangeably.
Census classification
The 1991 UK census was the first to include a question on ethnicity. As of the 2011 United Kingdom census, the Office for National Statistics and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency allow people in England and Wales and Northern Ireland who self-identify as "Black" to select "Black African", "Black Caribbean" or "Any other Black/African/Caribbean background" tick boxes. For the 2011 Scottish census, the General Register Office for Scotland also established new, separate "African, African Scottish or African British" and "Caribbean, Caribbean Scottish or Caribbean British" tick boxes for individuals in Scotland from Africa and the Caribbean, respectively, who do not identify as "Black, Black Scottish or Black British". The 2021 census in England and Wales maintained the Caribbean, African, and any other Black, Black British, or Caribbean background options, adding a write-in response for the "Black African" group. In Northern Ireland, the 2021 census had "Black African" and "Black Other" tick-boxes. In Scotland, the options were "African", "Scottish African" or "British African", and "Caribbean or Black", each accompanied by a write-in response box.In all of the UK censuses, persons with multiple familial ancestries can write in their respective ethnicities under a "Mixed or multiple ethnic groups" option, which includes additional "White and Black Caribbean" or "White and Black African" tick boxes in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
Historical usage
Black British or Black English was also a term for those Black and mixed-race people in Sierra Leone who were descendants of migrants from England and Canada and identified as British. They are generally the descendants of black people who lived in England in the 18th century and freed Black American slaves who fought for the Crown in the American Revolutionary War. In 1787, hundreds of London's black poor agreed to go to this West African colony on the condition that they would retain the status of British subjects, live in freedom under the protection of the British Crown, and be defended by the Royal Navy. Making this fresh start with them were some white people, including lovers, wives, and widows of the black men. In addition, nearly 1200 Black Loyalists, former American slaves who had been freed and resettled in Nova Scotia, and 550 Jamaican Maroons also chose to join the new colony.History
Antiquity
According to the Augustan History, North African Roman emperor Septimius Severus visited Hadrian's Wall in 210 AD, where he was said to have been mocked by an Ethiopian soldier holding a garland of cypress-boughs. Severus ordered him away, reportedly being "frightened" by his dark skin colour and seeing his act and appearance as an omen:On another occasion, when he was returning to his nearest quarters from an inspection of the wall at Luguvallum in Britain, at a time when he had not only proved victorious but had concluded a perpetual peace, just as he was wondering what omen would present itself, an Ethiopian soldier, who was famous among buffoons and always a notable jester, met him with a garland of cypress-boughs. And when Severus in a rage ordered that the man be removed from his sight, troubled as he was by the man's ominous colour and the ominous nature of the garland, the Ethiopian by way of jest cried, it is said, "You have been all things, you have conquered all things, now, O conqueror, be a god". And when on reaching the town he wished to perform a sacrifice, in the first place, through a misunderstanding on the part of the rustic soothsayer, he was taken to the Temple of Bellona, and, in the second place, the victims provided him were black. And then, when he abandoned the sacrifice in disgust and betook himself to the Palace, through some carelessness on the part of the attendants the black victims followed him up to its very doors.
Anglo-Saxon England
A girl buried at Updown, near Eastry in Kent in the early 7th century was found to have 33% of her DNA of West African type, most closely resembling Esan or Yoruba groups.In 2013, a skeleton was discovered in Fairford, Gloucestershire, which forensic anthropology suggested to be that of a Sub-Saharan African woman. Her remains have been dated between the years 896 and 1025. Local historians believe she was likely either a slave or a bonded servant.
16th century
A black musician is among the six trumpeters depicted in the royal retinue of Henry VIII in the Westminster Tournament Roll, an illuminated manuscript dating from 1511. He wears the royal livery and is mounted on horseback. The man is generally identified as the "John Blanke, the blacke trumpeter," who is listed in the payment accounts of both Henry VIII and his father, Henry VII. A group of Africans at the court of James IV of Scotland, included Ellen More and a drummer referred to as the "More taubronar". Both he and John Blanke were paid wages for their services. A small number of black Africans worked as independent business owners in London in the late 1500s, including the silk weaver Reasonable Blackman.When trade lines began to open between London and West Africa, people from this area began coming to Britain on board merchant and slaving ships. For example, merchant John Lok brought several captives to London in 1555 from Guinea. The voyage account in Hakluyt reports that they: "were tall and strong men, and could wel agree with our meates and drinkes. The colde and moyst aire doth somewhat offend them."
During the later 16th century as well as into the first two decades of the 17th century, 25 people named in the records of the small parish of St. Botolph's in Aldgate are identified as "blackamoors." In the period of the war with Spain, between 1588 and 1604, there was an increase in the number of people reaching England from Spanish colonial expeditions in parts of Africa. The English freed many of these captives from enslavement on Spanish ships. They arrived in England largely as a by-product of the slave trade; some were of mixed-race African and Spanish descent, and became interpreters or sailors. American historian Ira Berlin classified such persons as Atlantic Creoles or the Charter Generation of slaves and multi-racial workers in North America. Slaver John Hawkins arrived in London with 300 captives from West Africa. However, the slave trade did not become entrenched until the 17th century and Hawkins only embarked on three expeditions.
Jacques Francis has been described as a slave by some historians, but described himself in Latin as a "famulus", meaning servant, slave or attendant. Francis was born on an island off the coast of Guinea, likely Arguin Island, off the coast of Mauritania. He worked as a diver for Pietro Paulo Corsi in his salvage operations on the sunken St Mary and St Edward of Southampton and other ships, such as the Mary Rose, which had sunk in Portsmouth Harbour. When Corsi was accused of theft, Francis stood by him in an English court. With help from an interpreter, he supported his master's claims of innocence. Some of the depositions in the case displayed negative attitudes towards slaves or black people as witnesses.
In March 2019 two of the skeletons found on the Mary Rose were found to have Southern European or North African ancestry; one found to be wearing a leather wrist-guard bearing the arms of Catherine of Aragon and royal arms of England is thought to possibly be Spanish or North African, the other, known as "Henry" was thought to also have similar genetic makeup. Henry's mitochondrial DNA showed that his ancestry may have came from Southern Europe, the Near East, or North Africa, although Dr Sam Robson from the University of Portsmouth "ruled out" that Henry was black or that he was sub-Saharan African in origin. Dr Onyeka Nubia cautioned that the number of those on board the Mary Rose that had heritage beyond Britain was not necessarily representative of the whole of England at the time, although it definitely was not a "one-off". It is thought they are likely to have travelled through Spain or Portugal before arriving in Britain.
Blackamoor servants were perceived as a fashionable novelty and worked in the households of several prominent Elizabethans, including that of Queen Elizabeth I, William Pole, Francis Drake, and Anne of Denmark in Scotland. Among these servants was "John Come-quick, a blackemore", servant to Capt Thomas Love. Others included in parish registers include Domingo "a black neigro servaunt unto Sir William Winter", buried the xxviith daye of August and "Frauncis a Blackamoor servant to Thomas Parker", buried in January 1591. Some were free workers, although most were employed as domestic servants and entertainers. Some worked in ports, but were invariably described as chattel labour.
The African population may have been several hundred during the Elizabethan period, however not all were Sub-Saharan African. Historian Michael Wood noted that Africans in England were "mostly free... both men and women, married native English people." Archival evidence shows records of more than 360 African people between 1500 and 1640 in England and Scotland. Reacting to the darker complexion of people with biracial parentage, George Best argued in 1578 that black skin was not related to the heat of the sun but was instead caused by biblical damnation. Reginald Scot noted that superstitious people associated black skin with demons and ghosts, writing "But in our childhood our mothers maids have so terrified us with an ouglie divell having hornes on his head, and a taile in his breech, eies like a bason, fanges like a dog, clawes like a beare, a skin like a Niger and a voice roring like a lion"; historian Ian Mortimer stated that such views "are to be noted at all levels of society". Views on Black people were "affected by preconceived notions of the Garden of Eden and the Fall from Grace." In addition, in this period, England had no concept of naturalization as a means of incorporating immigrants into the society. It conceived of English subjects as those people born on the island. Those who were not were considered by some to be incapable of becoming subjects or citizens.
In 1596, Queen Elizabeth I issued letters to the lord mayors of major cities asserting that "of late divers blackmoores brought into this realm, of which kind of people there are already here to manie...". While visiting the English court, Casper Van Senden, a German merchant from Lübeck, requested the permission to transport "Blackamoores" living in England to Portugal or Spain, presumably to sell them there. Elizabeth subsequently issued a royal warrant to Van Senden, granting him the right to do so. However, Van Senden and Sherley did not succeed in this effort, as they acknowledged in correspondence with Sir Robert Cecil. In 1601, Elizabeth issued another proclamation expressing that she was "highly discontented to understand the great number of Negroes and blackamoors which are carried into this realm", and again licensing van Senden to deport them. Her proclamation of 1601 stated that the blackamoors were "fostered and powered here, to the great annoyance of own liege people, that covet the relief, which those people consume". It further stated that "most of them are infidels, having no understanding of Christ or his Gospel".
Studies of African people in early modern Britain indicate a minor continuing presence. Such studies include Imtiaz Habib's Black Lives in the English Archives, 1500–1677: Imprints of the Invisible, Onyeka's Blackamoores: Africans in Tudor England, Their Presence, Status and Origins, Miranda Kaufmann's Oxford DPhil thesis Africans in Britain, 1500–1640, and her Black Tudors: The Untold Story.