Do u have any information on Prince Edward the black prince and King James II the brother of Charles II?
Lion
This is unbelievably pathetic!
Note this is from wikipedia but as I've shown earlier racial slavery developed during the reign of Charles II as will as the expansion of the slave trade
quote:The Royal African Company was a slaving company set up by the Stuart family and London merchants once the former retook the English throne in the English Restoration of 1660. It was led by James, Duke of York, Charles II's brother....
In the 1680s it (Royal African Company) was transporting about 5,000 slaves per year. Many were branded with the letters 'DY', after its chief, the Duke of York, who succeeded his brother on the throne in 1685, becoming James II. Other slaves were branded with the company's initials, RAC, on their chests.
These are the other two articles I posted earlier on this thread
Among the adventurers in this trade, the British possess, at present, the greatest share. It was during the government of the commonwealth, that Negroes were carried, in any numbers, to the British West Indies, and then, chiefly to Barbadoes: a few indeed were brought to Virginia, by a Dutch ship, as early as 1620;but it was the Royal African Company, that first carried on, from England, a vigorous commerce to Africa, during the reign of Charles II.
quote:English suppliers responded to the increasing demand for slaves. In 1672, England officially got into the slave trade as the King of England chartered the Royal African Company, encouraging it to expand the British slave trade.
quote:Originally posted by Recovering Afro-holic: This is the typical pseudo scholarship game Afrocentrists like to play. Septimius was a N. African, born in Libya. Is Momar kadhaffi African BLACK? I highly doubt it.
quote:Originally posted by dana marniche: It is probable that some European royalty had black blood, but what in Severus history says that he was of indigenous African descent. He sure doesn't look any more African than all the other Romans. There were other European people in ancient North Africa besides the Romans as well especially in the area of Cyrene.
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I don't know who you are talking to but I have already seen many early portrayals of Septimius and no he doesn't look African as I said above. Being North african however doesn't mean much as one could have been anything from white Scythian to black or "Mauri" in ancient Libya, especially in that region.
Furthermore there are plenty of Roman busts that have been taken wrongly to be ancient Mauri and Carthaginians.
I asked a question which has not been answered yet. Nevertheless, at this present time i am taking it that he was one of the many European peoples that were said to be living in North Africa at that time.
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Obama is white, with no damn trace of any blackness, just like all these American crackers and that djehutitrash who soil my thread here! If you are so sure that Charles II Stuart was white, why do you pursue me all the way in Egypt land. Do you think you can stop me from spreading my theories to all the four corners of the world. What kind of fucking nutcase are you? Jeez! Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
So that is what it has all boils down to - Egmond has created his alternate reality, filled with its own made up facts and he resents anyone disturbing it. Well Egmond, if you want to create your own reality to cope with whatever inadequacies that you are unable to deal with then that is fine. But you are pushing your fantasy on to unsuspecting people. You have taken your imaginary world outside your mind and into society. That right there is a problem. Many delusional people like you have been institutionalized for this kind of behavior. Be-careful buddy.
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This description one finds in many books about the Stuarts. This proofs that white portraits of Charles II Stuart are revisionist fakes, over paints or propagandistic portraits.
quote:Charles' appearance was anything but English, with his sensuous curling mouth, dark complexion, black hair and dark brown eyes, he much resembled his Italian maternal grandmother, Marie de Medici's side of the family. During his escape after the Battle of Worcester, he was referred to as 'a tall, black man' in parliamentary wanted posters. One of the nick-names he acquired was the black boy His height, at six feet two inches, probably inherited from his Danish paternal grandmother, Anne of Denmark, also set him apart from his contemporaries in a time when the average Englishman was far smaller than today.
posted
You have some serious delusional or reading comprehension issues if you think the quote even remotely describes an African Black.
quote:Originally posted by Egmond Codfried: Charles' appearance was anything but English, with his sensuous curling mouth, dark complexion, black hair and dark brown eyes, he much resembled his Italian maternal grandmother, Marie de Medici's side of the family. During his escape after the Battle of Worcester, he was referred to as 'a tall, black man' in parliamentary wanted posters. One of the nick-names he acquired was the black boy His height, at six feet two inches, probably inherited from his Danish paternal grandmother, Anne of Denmark, also set him apart from his contemporaries in a time when the average Englishman was far smaller than today.
quote:Originally posted by Recovering Afro-holic: You have some serious delusional or reading comprehension issues if you think the quote even remotely describes an African Black.
quote:Originally posted by Egmond Codfried: Charles' appearance was anything but English, with his sensuous curling mouth, dark complexion, black hair and dark brown eyes, he much resembled his Italian maternal grandmother, Marie de Medici's side of the family. During his escape after the Battle of Worcester, he was referred to as 'a tall, black man' in parliamentary wanted posters. One of the nick-names he acquired was the black boy His height, at six feet two inches, probably inherited from his Danish paternal grandmother, Anne of Denmark, also set him apart from his contemporaries in a time when the average Englishman was far smaller than today.
Personally I don't see where Egmond said Charles II looked like an "African black". I think his point is that royalty had black blood in them which is probably true judging from the genealogy, and Europeans have tried to downplay it.
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posted
His point was not that he had Black blood. The point he was trying to make was that the man was Black. Here are his own words from the first page of the thread:
"Off course you guys understand that The black boy had a black father and mother as whites do not make white babies. His brother James II and his daughter Anne (a lesbian) were black, his sister maria Henriette Stuart was black and all the women he married and fucked were black. His bastards were black. His cousin The sun king, Louis XIV was black, as were all the Bourbons and Valois kings."
Does that sound like someone who is saying the person had black in his geneology OR the person WAS BLACK?
Just curious dana, did you even bother reading the entire thread?
quote:Originally posted by dana marniche: I think his point is that royalty had black blood in them which is probably true judging from the genealogy, and Europeans have tried to downplay it.
quote:Originally posted by Recovering Afro-holic: This is the typical pseudo scholarship game Afrocentrists like to play. Septimius was a N. African, born in Libya. Is Momar kadhaffi African BLACK? I highly doubt it.
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Froholic
Moamar Ghadaffi is blacker than you will ever be ...
He is a true African hero in a continent interwoven by blood and love
But you can believe what you can until you make the effort to go visit Africa in person.
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[Anna Boleyn’s daughter , Queen Elizabeth I, described as 'dark', so this portrat is whitened. She is famous for painting het face white]
ANNA BOLEYN’S APPEARANCE
quote: The Venetian diarist Marino Sanuto, who saw Anne during the meeting between Henry VIII and Francis I of France at Calais in October 1532, described her as "not one of the handsomest women in the world; she is of middling stature, swarthy complexion, long neck, wide mouth, bosom not much raised ... eyes, which are black and beautiful".[26] Simon Grynée wrote to Martin Bucer in September 1531 that Anne was "young, good-looking, of a rather dark complexion". Lancelot de Carles called her "beautiful with an elegant figure", and a Venetian in Paris in 1528 also reported that she was said to be beautiful.[27] Other descriptions of her were less neutral. An observer at her coronation wrote that "the crown became her very ill, and a wart disfigured her very much. She wore a violet velvet mantle, with a high ruff of gold thread and pearls, which concealed a swelling she has, resembling a goitre".[26] The most influential description of Anne, but also the least reliable, was written by the historian and polemicist Nicholas Sanders as late as 1586: "Anne Boleyn was rather tall of stature, with black hair, and an oval face of a sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice. She had a projecting tooth under the upper lip, and on her right hand six fingers. There was a large wen under her chin, and therefore to hide its ugliness she wore a high dress covering her throat ... She was handsome to look at, with a pretty mouth".[28] Sanders' description contributed to what biographer Eric Ives calls the "monster legend" of Anne Boleyn.[29]
quote: In 1532, a new Venetian ambassador described Anne thusly: 'not one of the handsomest women in the world. She is of middling stature, with a swarthy complexion, long neck, wide mouth, bosom not much raised, and in fact has nothing but the King's great appetite, and her eyes, which are black and beautiful - and take great effect on those who served the Queen when she was on the throne. She lives like a queen, and the King accompanies her to Mass - and everywhere.'
Anne Boleyn was very dark. All writers agree on this point. Wyatt says she was "not so whitely as . . . above all we may esteem." Sander said she had a "sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice", and the Venetian ambassador said she had a "swarthy complexion". Dark brown or black hair, along with eyes so dark they were almost black and a very dark skin, combined to make Anne Boleyn conspicuously dark - and the opposite of the contemporary ideal, with golden hair, blue eyes and a pink-and-white complexion. Anne had small breasts, when a voluptuous figure was the ideal. The Venetian ambassador said she was of "middling stature" and Sander said she was "rather tall in stature". One of her favourite chaplains felt that Bessie Blount was more beautiful, although Anne was quite pretty. Much of this lukewarm praise would have been due to the fact that she was the opposite of the aforesaid contemporary ideal.
In all honesty, the following description of Anne Boleyn is ridiculous; the culmination of a legend built up by Roman Catholics who blamed her for the break with Rome. Therefore, it owes much to the deeply ingrained idea that evil people had hideous exteriors, very much like Richard III's alleged hunchback. However, it goes a long way to illuminate the degree to which Anne was slandered long after her death.
Anne Boleyn was rather tall of stature, with black hair and an oval face of sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice. She had a projecting tooth under the upper lip, and on her right hand, six fingers. There was a large wen under her chin, and therefore to hide its ugliness, she wore a high dress covering her throat. In this she was followed by the ladies of the court, who also wore high dresses, having before been in the habit of leaving their necks and the upper portion of their persons uncovered. She was handsome to look at, with a pretty mouth.1
quote:Lise Nangala says No, you have to show better proof than this.
Images made in woodcuts – which Mr. Codfried refers to – often make people look darker than they really were. They only used two colours printing and tried to add definition to the faces by shading them. Add the poor quality printing in those days and you get darker faces.[...] Lise Nangala says To the description of Charles II as a tall black man. As a black woman living in a North European country (and married to a white man) I know that if white Europeans talk about a “black man” they mean someone with white skin and black hair. If they mean a man with black skin they still use the now forbidden words negro or nigger.
They are not woodcuts, but engravings on copperplate. As you will notice as you study thousands of them, like I did; the lace of the collar and the cuffs still appears white. The latest b.s. I have heard was of a fungus which attacks the copperplate and so the face appears black. Yet this evil fungus attacks only the part which depicts human flesh: the hands and the faces, but never the lace or cloth. It's a very dangerous fungus for knowing what part is a reflection of human flesh, it knows about virtual images, and thus must be from outer space, no?
These people always insist that black means black hair, but never give an example of this, as if they lived during the 17th century. My research also speaks about the many images of Moors in the western art and I have discovered that they are not real persons but symbols of blue blood. Blue blood symbolised by blacks = blue blood is black blood. They knew what blacks looked like and there was no need for any confusion on this head. Charles II Stuart was described as The Black boy, a tall black man and the swarthy Stuart. This leaves no room for any doubt. As they use a classical African to identify themselves, I cannot but conclude that their blackness was from Africa.
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posted
Egmond, something is seriously wrong with you. And I dare say you are more deranged than an Afrocenstrist.
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Obama is white, with no damn trace of any blackness, just like all these American crackers and that djehutitrash who soil my thread here! If you are so sure that Charles II Stuart was white, why do you pursue me all the way in Egypt land. Do you think you can stop me from spreading my theories to all the four corners of the world. What kind of fucking nutcase are you? Jeez!
DEFINITE AND IRREFUTABLE PROOF THAT OBAMA IS A WHITE MAN. PICTURES DO NOT LIE.Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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DEFINITE AND IRREFUTABLE PROOF THAT DIANA ROSS IS A WHITE WOMAN. PICTURES DO NOT LIE. Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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DEFINITE AND IRREFUTABLE PROOF THAT WHITNEY HOUSTON IS A WHITE WOMAN. PICTURES DO NOT LIE.Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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DEFINITE AND IRREFUTABLE PROOF THAT MARY J. BLIGE IS A WHITE WOMAN. PICTURES DO NOT LIE.Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
peut-être ça changera dans la tête des gens la mentalité de celui qui écoute mais qui n’entend pas avant que le silence descende sur chaque chose, ce grand silence après l’air explosé
(Eros Ramazzotti)
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posted
The mentality of the youth will never change and they will never listen to the ramblings and ravings of a lunatic, who thinks the mere mention of "Dark" must mean an African Negro. If pseudo scholarship is some explosion of knowledge, then God help me, bring on the silence! cause we don't need to hear that sh1t!
quote:Originally posted by Egmond Codfried: peut-être ça changera dans la tête des gens la mentalité de celui qui écoute mais qui n’entend pas avant que le silence descende sur chaque chose, ce grand silence après l’air explosé
Maria Henrietta Stuart, whitened, the sister of Charles II Stuart, The Black boy, with a Moor who offers her pearls. The Moor is not a person, but a symbol of blue blood. The pearls seem to symbolise Europe. Her blue blood offers her riches and power to rule.
Louise de Kerouaille, whitened, one of the six official mistresses of Charles II Stuart. A French noble, she was also known as the kings catholic whore.
Important for this research is the little Mooress at her lap who offers her pearls and coral. It's not a servant or a slave or a pet, nor is it a real person. The Mooress symbolises Kerouaille's blue blood. Because these Moors are African, and they symbolise the high nobility’s identity, I have to assume that they considered their blackness as African. How does Egmond Codfried know these things? Because he studied the goddam thing for three years already.
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posted
WOW! This is really quite disturbing. I think you are an embarassment to Afrocentrists. I don't even think they want to touch you w/a ten ft. pole. You post portraits of Europeans and their Negro slaves/servants yet you think it is proving your argument (LOL).
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Why would a noble family use six Moors in its crest? Why would they liked to be known and identified by their slaves?
These Moors are symbolic ancestors of this high noble family who's very name points to Moors. This crest shows their high nobility.
Alessandro de Medici, although born from a servant he rose to be a duke and a ruler of Florence. He ws nicknamed The Moor and his image was carried in gold as a proof of blue blood. The Moor could sometimes be a real family member.
The Drake Jewel.
The Moor in profile, over the profile of a white woman. This symbol I have defined as the black superiority symbol of black over white. Africa over white Europe.
Inside is Elizabeth I who was described as 'dark,' and her mother Anna Boleyn as 'very dark, with black eyes and dark hair.'
i cannot see how anyone will still assume that this Moor is a servant or a slave.
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-------------------- "TRUTH IS LIKE LIGHTNING WITH ITS ERRAND DONE BEFORE YOU HEAR THE THUNDER" - Gerald Massey "TRUTH IS FINAL" -Mumia Abu-Jamal Posts: 3446 | From: U.S. by way of JA by way of Africa | Registered: Jan 2010
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SIGILLUM SECRETUM (Secret Seal) On the image of the Blackamoor in European Heraldry (a preliminary proposal for an iconographical study)by Mario de Valdes y Cocom
Considering the deep roots of Christianity in the cultural experience of the African American community, it is only natural that even in the most cursory of discussions on Black history, the hope always is raised of discovering Christ as a man of colour. Moreover, in this global village of television and transatlantic travel, the standard Euro-centric portrayal of Christ is both anomalous and anachronistic, particularly in these racially sensitized times.
It might therefore prove a great source of spiritual strength and psychological affirmation for those of us of African descent if a relatively unknown and forgotten medieval European tradition regarding the image of the black was reconstructed for all to see and share.
What I am referring to are the coat of arms of the blackamoor which proliferated in both the private and civic European escutcheons (coat of arms) throughout the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries.
Due likely to the tradition attached to Sardinia's arms, these insignia have been all too facilely explained as the grizzly prize of some crusader conquest. The four African heads each displayed in one of the four quarters created by the cross on the shield are referred to by an early motto associated with this island's crest as 'trophea.' The traditional explanation is they represent the four Moorish emirs who were defeated by a king of Aragon sometime in the 11th century. (The possibility of a more probable approach to these insignia will be raised further on.) Such an interpretation would, of course, be more than welcome today, especially in the face of establishment attempts to portray as white the Islamic power that was able to withstand three successive waves of European invasions.
And, a common corollary to this negative view was the African figure became a symbol of evil, universal or personal, that had to be subjugated or vanquished. Given the economic/political positions of those with the right to bear arms, the hold that heraldry has had on the imagination of the West has been a very powerful one and this particular perception of the blackamoor as a symbol of the negative has undoubtedly played an enormous part in the propagation of racism.
The Imagery of St. Maurice
Modern specialists in the science of heraldry suspect, however, that this blazon (coat of arms) of the blackamoor is instead the very opposite of a negative symbol. In the last decade or two it has been pointed out that the moor's head quite possibly could have referred to St. Maurice, the black patron saint of the Holy Roman Empire from the beginning of the 10th century.
Because of his name and native land, St. Maurice had been portrayed as black ever since the 12th century. The insignia of the black head, in a great many instances, was probably meant to represent this soldier saint since a majority of the arms awarded were knightly or military. With 6,666 of his African compatriots, St. Maurice had chosen martyrdom rather than deny his allegiance to his Lord and Saviour, thereby creating for the Christian world an image of the Church Militant that was as impressive numerically as it was colourwise.
Here, no doubt, is a major reason why St. Maurice would become the champion of the old Roman church and an opposition symbol to the growing influence of Luther and Calvin. The fact that he was of the same race as the Ethiopian baptized by St. Philip in Acts of the Apostles was undoubtedly an important element to his significance as well. Since this figure from the New Testament was read as a personification of the Gentile world in its entirety, the complexion of St. Maurice and his Theban Legion (the number of which signified an infinite contingent) was also understood as a representation of the Church's universality - a dogmatic ideal no longer tolerated by the Reformation's nationalism. Furthermore, it cannot be coincidental that the most powerful of the German princes to remain within the Catholic fold, the archbishop Albrecht von Brandenburg, not only dedicated practically all the major institutions under his jurisdiction to St. Maurice but in what is today one of the most important paintings of the Renaissance, had himself portrayed in Sacred Conversation with him. Even more blatant was the action taken by Emanual Philibert, Duke of Savoy. In 1572 he organized the order of St. Maurice. The papal promulgation published at its institution declared quite unequivocally that the sole purpose for this knighthood was to combat of the Reformation. The order still exist exists although it has now combined with the Order of St. Lazarus. The white trefoiled cross of the combined order belongs to the former.
The particular symbol of St. Maurice's blackness that must have most antagonized the Protestant faction, however, was the one regarding the mystery of Papal authority. Scholars have been able to show, for example, that in the theological debates of this period, even the abstract adjectives, black and white, were defiantly acknowledged by apologists of both stripes to represent the Church and the Reformers respectively.
Prester John
In addition to St. Maurice, there is also another figure connected to the blackamoor coat of arms. It is the semi-mythical Negus (emperor) of Ethiopia, Prester John. To Otto von Freising an Imperial Hohenstauffen Prince Bishop of the 12th century who was tired and torn by the endless struggle between Church and State, this black man who was both priest and king and ruled a land of peace and plenty at the edge of the world became the personification of the ideal state. To this day the arms of the see of Freising is the bust of a crowned blackamoor.
Because of their ethnic and geographic origins, it is likely that St. Maurice and his Theban Legion became associated with Prester John as the ideal soldiers for the ideal state. It should be pointed out, furthermore, that, heraldically, since he was the only monarch who could claim the 'Sang Real' or the 'Royal Blood' of Christ because of his descent from Solomon, Prester John was the only individual deemed worthy of the right to bear as arms the image of the Crucifix. Even the earring traditionally worn by the blackamoor is a reference to this sacred privilege.
The Golden Ring in the Blackamoor's Ear
To understand how these two objects are related to each other--the earring and the image of the Crucifix--we must refer back to the Old Testament. In the Book of Leviticus can be found an ordinance describing the ritual ear piercing of any slave who chooses to continue in his master's service after being granted his freedom. Since one of the most important of all Ethiopian royal titles was "Slave of the Cross," the golden ring in the blackamoor's ear was probably meant to be interpreted as a deeply devotional and--considering the belief in the Bible as the Word of God--a highly rhetorical symbol.
Ethiopia and the Holy Grail
Due also to the age-old belief that the Ark of the Covenant had been hidden in Ethiopia, the great epics of the Arthurian cycle transformed the Ethiopian emperor into the founder of the Grail dynasty and the ancestor, nine generations later, of the only knight of the Round Table who would achieve the Quest, Sir Galahad. It would appear that the long-standing confusion over whether the Holy Grail was a cup or a stone was a deliberate one. Considering the opportunity afforded by these Ethiopian traditions, medieval writers were able to theologically fuse together the symbols of both the Old and the New Testament: the Tablet of the Law and the Chalice.
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In the middle of the 14th century, one of the most profound examples of the symbol of the blackamoor can be seen in the use of this image to represent Christ. It is clear from the documentation we have for the city of Lauingen in Germany, for example, that at about this time, the city's seal with the head of Christ wearing a crown of thorns is transformed to the head of a blackamoor wearing a golden crown. That the latter insignia is meant to represent the former is quite obvious from the accompanying inscriptions. One of the earlier ones read: "Sigillum civium de Lougingin" (seal of the city of Lauingen), while a later version clearly explains itself as the "Sigillum secretum civitatis palatinae Lavgingen (secret seal of the palatinate city of Lauingen)."
A German heraldic scholar writing before World War II offered two other reasons for a similar coats of arms. He pointed out that Ethiop (sun burnt) the black was a sun sign and therefore a symbol of divinity that could alternately be used for the Son of God or the Son of Man. He also pointed out that from what we know of the cult of the Black Madonna, the blazon of the blackamoor queen was a reference to Mary, the Queen of Heaven or her prefiguration as the Queen of Sheba and that the male versions of these insignia were therefore references to her Son.
The discovery of this particular seal was especially surprising to me since I had taken for granted that it was either another reference to Prester John or, even more likely, to Balthazar, the black Wise man of the Epiphany who has, iconographically, almost always been treated as a king. Because his gift of myrrh prophesied not only Our Lord's death but, most importantly, His Resurrection and the proof, therefore, of His divinity, the awe Balthazar's blackness inspired must have had a powerful impression on the science of heraldry. A coat of Arms that is apparently derived from the same theological source as that of the city of Lavingen belongs to the Cruse or Cross family of France. Since cockle shells are so liturgically associated with the sacrement of baptism, their number here probably signifies the three nails of the Crucifixion while the women, in all likelyhood, are representations of Mary and the Queen of Sheba.
The Arms of King Balthazar
No more graphic a demonstration of the African figure as a symbol of the sun is to be found than in the arms ascribed to King Balthazar. Initially this had posed a problem for me since the ethnic background of this Wise Man, to my mind, was simply not enough of a reason for this heraldic device. It was not until coming upon an early text describing his coat of arms as that of the sun that I at last realized what the blackamoor on Balthazar's livery signified. Since King Melchior bore a field of stars and King Kaspar, the moon, it is fairly obvious that as an allusion, no doubt, to the celestial phenomenon which had guided them to Bethlehem, the original arms of the Magi had been the sun, the moon and the stars. I do not think it would be unreasonable to suppose that for whatever theological line of reasoning, the heraldic insignia of both Balthazar and the city of Lauingen had been changed at the same point in history.
Blackness as an Allusion to God
Perhaps even more remarkable, especially from our perspective today, is evidence which would suggest that in the language of heraldry, the blackamoor could be an allusion to God Himself. The most obvious of these examples are to be found in the arms of the city of Coburg, the Kob family of Nuremberg and the Pucci of Florence. Since these three names are derived from that of Jacob (Coburg=Jacoburg, Kob=Jakob, Pucci=Jacopucci), the clue is to be found in the Book of Genesis. Very much along the lines of the old Hebrew injunction against uttering the Holy Name, it was the second century theologian, Dionysius the Aereopagite, who first alluded to God as, "The Divine Darkness".
In the passage relating the changing of his name to that of Israel, Jacob discovers that the dark spirit he has wrestled with all night long is none other than God in the impenetrable image of His infinite Self. The fact that the name, James, is nothing other than a variant of Jacob, might well provide us with the significance for the arms of Sardinia I described earlier since it is to the Aragonese king, James 1, that their use can first be traced.
Blackness as Wisdom
One of the most dramatic and, certainly, most graphic uses of blackness as wisdom can be seen in the portrayal of the Good Thief from a number of 15th century Flemish masterpieces depicting the Crucifixion. For the ability to recognize his Saviour's spiritual supremacy beneath the harsh reality of the Cross, St. Dismas is not only painted as an African, he is painted blindfolded as well. The blindfold on certain blackamoor coat of arms, therefore, is not a mistakenly placed headband or torse, the standard headpiece of this specific symbol when a crown is not called for. This blazon is, instead, an exhortation or, more precisely, a divine demand that we not only respond to the weakest and most helpless of our neighbours as we would Our Lord but, like St. Dismas, that we do so even while in the death throes of our own personal crucifixions. Interestingly enough, a number of early theologians writing on this subject, have attributed to the Black Wise Man's colour the same kind of reasoning from which St. Dismas would derive his doubly dark imagery; his ability to recognize the Messiah in a lowly manger.
The social gospel so strikingly symbolized by this example of the blackamoor blazon is also, interestingly enough, quite implicit in even its most negative use-- that of the vanquished infidel. From what is known regarding the popularity of the Charlemagnian epics during the latter middle ages, we can assume that this image was, in all probability, associated with Marsile, the black heathen king who, as the enemy of all Christendom, was Charlemagne's paramount opponent. Offered baptism at his defeat, Marsile had instead chosen death rather than accept a faith whose adherents he scornfully mocked and condemned for their immoral and reprehensible treatment of the poor. An image that was so scathing a reminder of a community's responsibility to its less fortunate could, therefore, have only been perceived as a positive one.
The relationship of the black image to the concept of justice was nowhere more politically utilized than with the Holy Roman emperors of the Hohenstauffern dynasty. Indeed, it would appear that the sable blazon of the imperial eagle and that of the moor's head were meant to be perceived as synonymous. The simple headbands worn by both are, as a matter of fact, identical and, interestingly enough, nothing less, despite the simplicity of the design, than the imperial diadem' of ancient Rome. Also interesting is the fantastic coat of arms attributed to Ethiopia by the heralds of the middle ages. For like the bicephalic bird of the Holy Roman Empire, Ethiopia bore a 'v' shaped emblem with a blackamoor's head 'torsed' at the end of each arm.
This parallelism between both sets of heads can, of course, be explained by the "rex / sacerdos" argument which occupied the very centre of the political stage during this particular period of history. To both the Pope who preached the imperial nature of his sanctified position and the emperor, Frederick II, who believed in the priestliness of his own power, the figure of the African priest king, Prester John, became an almost magical icon politically. If we can interpret the double-headed eagle represented the claims of both the church and the state, it would be quite logical to surmise that the reason why Ethiopia's arms were conceived as double-headed is due to the belief already mentioned that the Negus (emperor) exercised the prerogatives of both priest and king.
As Joseph Campbell has pointed out, it was to this African figure that European literature first attributed the very concept of popular justice. Indeed, while the Church showed off his famous letter of introduction and circulated copies of it to the Christian world, rumors in Frederick's own lifetime made him an intimate friend of this semi-mythical king. According to popular belief, for instance, Prester John had presented him with armor made of asbestos, the elixir of youth, a ring of invisibility and, most precious of all, the philosopher's stone.
Because they are described in the 'Tristam und Isult' cycles, the arms of Sir Pallamedes, the Moorish prince who becomes a knight of the Round Table, have received a certain amount of scholarly attention. Chequered in black and white, this highly contrasting design would appear to be nothing more than perhaps the most abstract icon of those dualities already pointed to, such as God and Jacob (Jacquelado is the word for checkered in Spanish), or Church and State. Instead of his coat armour, it is the body of Sir Fierfitz Angevin, the black knight from Eschenbach's 'Parzival' that is patterned in a piebald motif. The fact that the poet likens Fierfitz's skin to a parchment with writing is what expands this symbol to its most encompassing parameters.
To the Greeks, Pallamedes, the mythological figure from whom Sir Tristam's Moorish companion derives his name, was commemorated as the inventor of writing, counting, weighing and measuring and the games of the chessboard. Since his name translates as 'Ancient Wisdom', it has been suggested that all dualistic tensions were intended to be nuanced; from the most simple 'yes or no', 'O or I' to the most sophisticated of Parmenedes' models regarding 'The I and the Thou' or 'The One and the Many'. Obviously playing with the same kind of bifurcated symbolism as the Hohenstauffern eagle or the two headed branch of Ethiopia, the writer of the prose Tristam recounts that of all the knights of the Round Table, Sir Pallamedes was the only one who wore two swords. Whether as a reference to Pallamedes' name or the political wisdom Prester John stood for, or, perhaps, as a conflation of both, it is interesting that the blackamoor's head was one of the earliest watermarks in the history of paper making. Examples collected date from about 1380 to 1460.
Another possible reason for the imagery of Sir Pallamedes could well have been a rather ironic geo-political one. During the dark ages the culture of the Roman empire had, for the most part, been fairly obliterated. During the Crusades, western intellectuals became all too aware that it was their adversaries they would have to turn to for any advance in their educational systems since the moslem world had become the reservoir of classical Greco Roman learning. Due to the Saracen sages with which Frederick II surrounded himself, for example, Sicily developed into one of the most important intellectual centers of Europe, spreading the scholarship that had been derived from Arab translations. His court was so Islamic in its splendor that not only in the Midde East but throughout Europe he was referred to as 'Sultan.'
Since the Fatimid dynasty of Egypt during the 11th and 12th centuries had been of Sudanese extraction, and because their armed forces during this period had been augmented by a compliment of fifty thousand black troops a year, it should not be too difficult to understand how the image of the African had come to be associated, like Sir Pallamedes, with "ancient wisdom."
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The rest of the pictures that belong above (I can't post more than eight in one thread at a time, apparently):
-------------------- "TRUTH IS LIKE LIGHTNING WITH ITS ERRAND DONE BEFORE YOU HEAR THE THUNDER" - Gerald Massey "TRUTH IS FINAL" -Mumia Abu-Jamal Posts: 3446 | From: U.S. by way of JA by way of Africa | Registered: Jan 2010
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Besides this possible reference to Prester John, another reason for the black blazon of the imperial eagle is to be found in the rules and regulations governing the use of 'metals' and 'tinctures' in coat armour.
Following the classical Greek analysis of light and colour, black and white were considered the two primaries since the interplay between light and dark is what was held to produce the spectrum. Furthermore, white, or more accurately, light, was not defined as a colour or 'tincture' but as the gold or the silver which, to this day, are still the only options for the term 'metal' in the language of heraldry. Black, therefore, was considered the most important of colours, ranking above the red, blue and green standardly referred to as 'tinctures'.
Thirteenth century texts explaining the imperial insignia go even further. Because of medieval conceptions of the absorption of light by darkness, the writers theorized that within the color black was contained all the light or the white it had displaced.
This is obviously the reason why when the ruby is substituted for red or 'gules' and the emerald for green or 'vert' according to the traditions of gemnological blazonry, it is nothing other than the diamond that stands for 'sable'. In all probability, it is also this line of reasoning that contributed to the cult of the Black Madonna. For, having borne the Light of Creation within her very womb, the devotion to the Mother of God as the (coal) black Queen of Heaven is a superb example of how this law of physics was at one time interpreted.
According to the early heralds, the black eagle on a field of gold translated quite literally to, "As God is in Heaven so is the Emperor on Earth". The colour of its outspread wings was explicitly said to symbolize the embodiment or the materialization of light. Furthermore, since it was also held that the dark, by its interaction with the light is what produced the spectrum, the colour black apparently came to represent the intermediary position a divine rights monarch maintained between his God and his people. If the eagle, therefore, was the zoomorphic symbol of these ideas, the blackamoor in Hohenstauffern Europe could only have been interpreted as their anthropomorphic equivalent. Indeed, there is another explanation for the imperial eagle's blackness that bears this out. As the most powerful of birds flying so close to the sun, it, like the Ethiop, was regarded as a solar symbol.
Perhaps because it is so recent and therefore so comparatively easier to interpret, one of the more exciting examples of the blackamoor as a symbol of the Redeemer is the one to be found in an insignia designed by Pope Pius VII in the early part of the last century. Commonly referred to as the Moretto, it was awarded to the Princes of the Academy of St. Luke, a class of nobles created exclusively for artists by the Holy See in recognition of their life's work and contributions to the field. It is in the age old tradition that St. Luke once painted a portrait of the Infant Jesus where the key to the symbolism of this Papal decoration can be found. The fact that St. Luke is also an evangelist, is evidence enough that at least, allegorically, he had succeeded in the challenge which, as a true artist, he would, of course, have had to confront--that of conveying in his painting the divine reality incarnate in the form of a human child. As clearly then as the Moretto or, in English, the Little Moor is a metaphor for the incarnate God St. Luke portrayed, so too is the implied challenge to the artist: to portray for the world the Divinity nascent in it.
It is this last example in particular which leads me to think that the blackamoor figured candelabra dating back a century or two earlier was meant to be seen in this light. Instead of another embarrassing icon like the lawn jockey or the Aunt Jemima cookie jar--those examples of main stream Americana which many of us find so embarrassing--this classic European 'object d'art' was probably intended either as an injunction or a blessing. And, from what I have already pointed out regarding the imagery of St. Maurice, perhaps the most negative significance they might have had is that they were also intended as Counter-Reformation propaganda.
What I hope I have, at least, succeeded in providing here is the outline for a study which, even though based on so arcane and romantically European a tradition as heraldry, could nevertheless prove a great deal more revolutionary than any of the more 'politically correct' approaches to black history undertaken thus far.
For if this was the visual language that once articulated or signified the most important of the spiritual, cultural and political aspirations of the West, it would not be too difficult to imagine the kind of impact such a primer or catechism of positive black symbolism could have today on those whose self imagery has been so consistently and so systematically destroyed by the racism of our more recent past.
Today, one of the few vestiges that remain of this medieval mysticism can be found in the colour of the robes we wear at graduation--that right of passage by which society declares us to be 'educated'--and the robes of those who make decisions regarding our legal affairs. Although clerical garb might be interpreted as the rejection of worldly comforts and benefits, it is, therefore, a mark of the wearer's more profound pursuit as well. And, as every woman knows, it is the secret of the little black basic which can add immeasurably to her air of sophistication.
On his father' side Ustinov is a member of the old Russian nobility. But on his mother's side, he is a member of the Ethiopian Royal Family. The origin of this interracial line was the marriage of his great grandfather, a Swiss military engineer, with the daughter of the Emperor Theodore II. Forbidden to leave Ethiopia, as were the most valued of the Europeans who joined the Imperial service, the engineer had been wedded to the princess, apparently not only in compensation, but to insure his loyalty to the Emperor.
The former Ethiopian legation to Canada, who were then working with the Department of MultiCultural Affairs in Quebec related how, on a number of occasions, they had requested Ustinov to represent Ethiopia to the media in the same way that he had Russia during the years of the cold war when he appeared to be the only cultural liaison between the Soviet Union and the West. Apparently because of the racial climate at the time, Ustinov had not been able to rise to the occasion. Indeed, in his first two autobiographies, he described his great grandmother as a Portuguese woman at the Ethiopian court. It was not until sometime later that he acknowledged his royal genealogy during a CBC Radio interview.
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In 1980, an unsigned painting acquired by the Rhode Island School of Design a few years earlier, was identified as the work of the once-popular French artist, Guillaume Guillon Lethiere who was born in 1760. Although such attributions are rarely newsworthy, what should have made this one more interesting to us as Americans than even the French themselves is information concerning Lethiere's ancestry that has only recently come to light.
Like Alexandre Dumas, the author of Man In The Iron Mask, Lethiere was a man of color. (I am hoping that the presence of this painting in Rhode Island will prove providential. For, RISD was founded by Providence's art community to celebrate the prize which one of their members - the African American Edward Bannister - won for landscape painting at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition in 1876.)
Biographical material on Lethiere always mention he was the illegitimate son of a colonial official from the French West Indian island of Guadalupe. However, it was not until 1977, in a five-volume work on Ingres (who had been a student of his) that Lethiere's mother was described as a mulatto. Judging from the portraits Ingres did of him, however, she was probably more Caucasian - no doubt, a quadroon like so many of the mixed blood women of the French colonies whether here in New Orleans or des Antilles, whose sway over their white masters had almost become legendary by the end of the 18th century.
On the other hand, it is quite possible that, even if she were as black as claimed, he simply did not inherit any of his mother's African features - except the curliness of his hair and perhaps a shorter distance between eye and brow than is usually perceptible in white males. One reason why he was not brought to the attention of the African American community two decades ago is more than likely due to the fact that the biography of Ingres by Hans Naef in which this information appears was published in German.
What makes Lethiere so relevant to us in this still racially-troubled society of ours today is the fact that - as easy as it would have been for him to pass for white - he never did. Even the style of painting which he so tenaciously adhered to was proof of his lifelong commitment to social and racial justice. Now referred to as Neo-classical, it was a school of painting which, through its illustration of the Roman histories, attempted to create politically-loaded allegories on the subject of civil and national duties. From about the time of Lethiere's arrival in France in 1774, artists had begun to uses this idiom to propagandize ideas growing around the concept of democracy which would eventually break out as the French Revolution.
Coincidentally, the painting in RISD's possession was Lethiere's submission to the Salon of 1785 - one of the most important showings in the history of Western art since it was on this occasion that David exhibited his Oath of the Horatii. Critics at the time were stunned by its political power and to this day scholars, whether in the humanities or the social sciences, point to this event as the beginning of the Revolution. What makes the relationship between the two pictures of Lethiere and David even tighter is their subject matter. Indeed, the fact that they are both illustrations of the same story became an important clue in the dating of Lethiere's work since it was the interpretation of this tragedy, taken from the Roman author, Livy, which had been prescribed by the Academie for that year. The scene Lethiere painted shows the death of Camille at the hands of her own brother, one of the Horatii. She had fallen in love with an enemy of the state who was soon slain in battle. On her brother's triumphant return from the war, her hysterical reaction proved too much for him and he dispatched her with his sword. Perhaps indicative of both their personal and professional relationship even then, David's masterpiece represents the opening of the drama which Lethiere so gruesomely ends.
According to his contemporaries, Lethier not only became the first to take up this risky and overtly polemical style of David's, even more significant is that he began openly competing with David over techniques in composition, color, etc. with which to stretch to their very limits the Revolutionary rhetoric they were interpreting. The violence of the scenes he depicted and the highly emotional expressiveness with which he rendered the characters involved became a hallmark of his oeuvre. Even though the critics later tried to dissuade him of such mannerisms, he held steadfastly to a credo that the voice of the artist, in contrast to those of falsehood, corruption and oppression is marked by its immoderation. As the social historian, Thomas Crow, explains, "By the standards of society, [the intellectual's] discourse may be awkward, over-direct, embarrassingly impassioned, but these qualities are themselves the sign of the truth of his words."
Despite or, perhaps, precisely because of the "embarrassingly impassioned" dedication with which he attacked his canvases, Lethiere, like his rival, David, became an official propagandist for the Revolution. Hardly a dozen years ago, another work which had also just been reattributed to him was hailed as the chef-d'oeuvre of the Museum of the French Revolution. Entitled The Homeland in Danger, it was painted to help institute a conscription system adopted by the Council of Five Hundred to protect the country from the armies of the Second Coalition that had begun threatening its borders in the spring of 1799. A reviewer of the Salon for that year wrote:
It is large, this canvass: full of verve and effect...In the center, the elite of the French youth breathe the fire of combat and their mood anticipates victory. Victory is writ large on their generous faces and their forceful aspects. The magistrate has not said more than one word: Remember, you have the honour of being French. Enflamed and beautiful with the virtue and the passion for liberty, the women love these heroes. The young men receive their kisses and embraces; they vanquish...The action of those who bear arms is energetic and truthful! It is faith that gives them title to love and glory, the two passions that are truly French. The intensity of Lethiere's political conviction in all probability stemmed from his racially mixed heritage. To someone like himself, all the rhetoric regarding Liberte, Egalite and Fraternite would have been that much more urgent. In 1777, only three years after his arrival in France, a royal edict charged
"...we are now informed that the number of blacks in France has multiplied too much for the facilitation of commerce between America and France, that arriving daily from the colonies are proportionately too many men needed there to work the land, that at the same time, their sojourn here in the towns of our kingdom, especially in the capital, embues them with a spirit of independence and insubordination making them more nuisances than useful on their return to the colonies" It was consequently ordered that French ports would thenceforth be closed to the entry of Negroes, mulattos, and other people of colour. Persons attempting to bring anyone of this racially proscribed group into the country would be fined. A year later an act followed forbidding marriage between whites and blacks. Any notary writing either a licensee or a contract for such a marriage would be subject to a fine and the parties entering into such a marriage would be expelled to the colonies. Just how seriously these regulations were enforced is not too clear. Racial feelings of this kind appear to have been limited to French West Indian planters and their friends among the aristocracy and the upper bourgeoisie. Furthermore, the abolition of slavery and the slave trade was, from the middle of the century, as important as any of the popular movements leading up to the revolution. No research has yet been done to make an assessment of Lethiere's reaction to such laws. The only indication we have for the time being is his life-long dedication, both as an artist and as a teacher, to the political tenets of Neo-classicism.
During the French Revolution, Negroes and mulattos figured prominently as group. Among them were representatives of the black population des Antilles to the parliamentary bodies in Paris. At the outset of the Revolution, the whites from the colonies sent only their own representatives. This led to a letter of protest to the National Assembly in 1789, in which certain mulattos who designated themselves, "Commissioners and Deputies of the coloured citizens of the French Isles and Colonies," demanded that the Negroes and mulattos of Santo Domingo, Martinique and Guadeloupe be represented as well as whites. In a subsequent speech he delivered to the Assembly on behalf of the gens de couleur libre in Santo Domingo to which he belonged, Julien Raimond, a noted lawyer practicing in Paris even offered six million livres as security for the national debt if the government complied. C. L. R. James has noted that considering how wealthy this class had become by then, this was no idle proposition. However, due to the machinations of the Colonial Committee which, as its name indicates, was controlled by the white planters, it took five years before the black delegates were seated. On February 4th, 1794, the abolition of slavery throughout French possessions was declared and in his reception of the new members to the Convention, the president kissed each of them on both cheeks. Whether just a coincidence or not, it is interesting that five of the seven representatives welcomed that day were sent to the Council of Five Hundred, the same legislative body for whom he painted The Homeland in Danger in 1799.
The almost messianic role David played in French art did not completely eclipse Lethier's output or his career. From the press his critics gave him it is quite clear that he was respected as a worthy runner-up, if not a potential competitor, of the older man. In 1784, the year before the David's monumental achievement, for instance, Lethiere had placed second in the Prix de Rome and in 1786, the year after, the Academie declared that even though he had not succeeded in winning one, he deserved a pension and granted him a scholarship to study in Rome. Besides taking care of his expenses, even more importantly, this award (which David had also been given a dozen years earlier) guaranteed the recipient lucrative commissions on his return to France.
Who or what his sources were Lethiere did not say, but the following by T. Oriol from his Hommes Celebres de Guadalupe gives us some idea not only of his career as a teacher but as a competitor of David's.
"Between Lethiere's students and those of David's, what started off as courteous rivalry, little by little, became pronounced to the point of becoming violent opposition. The first were among the revolutionary in the matter of art. The second exaggerated the classicism of their master. With them, the purity of style was reduced to artistic poverty; the search for absolute equilibrium reduced to a mirror like symmetry. And as youth tend to exteriorise their sentiment and ideas, they expressed through their clothes, their mannerisms and their language, a glacial dignity and haughtiness which was strange to see in their young ways and candid faces. It goes without saying that Lethiere's students adopted exactly opposite ways. In their studios there was more of a tendency to attack a canvases than to hold a seance over it. Warriors, a bit intimidating, they roamed the streets, unshaven, making fun of David and heedless of what anyone thought of them...the artistic and literary public was itself divided into two camps: one, partisans of the School of Lethiere, the other, faithful admirerers of David." It would seem that in the Bonaparte family, sides had been taken as well. For when Napoleon came to power he kept David on as the state's adjudicator of the arts while his brother, Lucien, took Lethiere into his patronage. As artistic advisor to Lucien Bonaparte, Lethiere collected a great many of the Spanish paintings in the Louvre today. No doubt the high point of his career, however, were the years he spent as Director of the Academie de France in Rome. Even how this came about should serve as a measure of the tendresse the country as a whole evidently felt for him. Because of some remark or other made about his mustache by one of a group of officers in the Imperial army trying to strike up a conversation with him in a cafe, the hot-tempered Lethiere who had no sympathy for Napolon's ambitions started a fight in which one of the men was killed and another wounded. Instead of being tried for a capital offense, the government ordered his studio closed. With no other options available to him, Lethiere and his family were forced to traipse through Europe like gypsies until, thanks to the intervention of his patron, Lucien Bonaparte, he was appointed to this rather prestigious position.
Until we learn a bit more of this man's personal history, the only instance that has been suggested of any racial prejudice he might have experienced was the incident in which his election to the Institute was vetoed by Louis XVIII. But even this slight could simply have been due to his politics. His probably rather rude reactions to the loss of his post in Rome at the restoration of the monarchy in 1814, a not surprising result of his staunch republicanism, had in all likelihood made the rounds at Versailles. Whatever the cause of the king's initial antipathy to Letheire, he finally gave in to the wishes of the Institute a couple of years later and not only confirmed the artist's election to that august body but assented to his induction as a Knight of the Legion of Honour, as well.
Although it would by no means prove whether or not the contretemps between the King and Lethiere had in any way been a racial one, it should nevertheless be pointed out that another Chevalier Noire originally from Guadeloupe had been appointed head of the Paris Opera by Louis XV. Much darker than the painter, the Chevalier de St. Georges, a very gifted composer and all around athlete popular at court during the Ancien Regime, declined the King's invitation on overhearing that one of the sopranos was "disinclined to be directed by a mulatto."
How the king's initial decision might later have been interpreted as racist can probably be traced back to another crisis Lethiere had to deal with during this particular period of his life. From a report in the Gazette de France dated February 28th, 1819, which Hans Naef reprinted in his biographical chapter on Lethiere, we learn that a distant relative had, over a number of years, been attempting to challenge the rights to the estate the artist had inherited from his father, Pierre Guillon. It is neither his illegitimacy or the race of his mother, Marie-Francoise Pepaye, that was at issue. Although both these points are made in the dossier, the issue being debated before the court was the date of his birth. If, as his cousin, M. Delpeyron, insisted, Lethier had been born in 1765, three years after Guillon's marriage, then he was the child of an adulterous liaison and as such could not be officially recognized by his father. What this apparently meant, could Depeyron prove it, was that according to French law, Lethiere would not have been entitled to his patrimony. As the Gazette triumphantly reported, however, the court ruled in favour of Lethiere and later that year he was further rewarded for his contribution to his country with a tenured professorship at the Ecole des Beaux Arts.
Of the little that is known concerning this French master, the most overtly racial episode in his long career is the one revolving around a painting he executed about ten years before his death and which has only recently come to light. Long believed lost in a fire that had ravaged the Cathedral of Haiti where it hung, the badly damaged piece was discovered in 1991. Thanks to the initiative of the Association des Amis de Lethiere, a cultural organization set up in Guadeloupe in 1988 by Genevieve Capy and G. Florent Labelle, it has been restored under the Direction des Musees de France. Entitled the Oath of the Ancestors, the canvas measuring 333 x 225 cm. represents the two principal artisans of the Haitian independence, the Generals Petion and Dessalines, swearing their united opposition to slavery and their defense of the Haitian constitution. Considering that the very light skinned Petion was from the same privileged class of mulatto elites as his mother had been and one which until the French Revolution had itself proved so viciously antagonistic to the demands of the blacker segments of the population, this painting can probably be read as an apologia by Lethiere on behalf of those who, like himself, were of racially mixed background. As has been pointed out by the curators at the Louvre where this work was on display in February and March 1998, this is the only painting on which the artist affixed the words ne a la Guadeloupe to his signature.
Besides Lethiere's submission to the Salon of 1785, three other pieces have turned up in New England which are an important part of this man's story since they are portraits of himself and his family. In 1966, Harvard University's Fogg museum acquired a profile in pencil of Lethiere by Ingres. The Fogg also owns a seated portrait of Lethiere's wife in the same medium and by the same artist. Back in 1959, the MFA had already picked up a drawing, also by Ingres, of the artist's son Alexandre, his wife, Rosina and their daughter, Letizia. These had all been done by Ingres while he was a pensioner of Lethier's at the Academy's Villa Medici in Rome. Even though he was not yet born to have figured as the child in the MFA's group portrait as had originally been presumed, it should be mentioned that like his grandfather, Alexandre's son, Charles, was also knighted. In a citation that would have made his West Indian ancestor's heart burst with pride, the journal, Le Siecle, not known for exaggeration or religious sentiments, wrote:
"A distinguished homeopathic doctor, Doctor Lethier, prodigious in his indefatigable activity and the most laudable selflessness, has for more than fifteen years, administered to the needs of the most indigent among the sick. Informed of his devotion and his perseverance, the Holy See of Rome has bestowed on Doctor Lethier, the Cross of the Knights of Saint Gregory the Great. This award is certainly well deserved." Indeed, in a tribute to Doctor Lethiere published by another of the journals that reported this award, his grandfather was not only commemorated for his talent as an artist but, even more importantly, given the context in which he was referred to, Guillaume Guillon, dit Le Thiers, was honoured as a man who had "distinguished himself for his private virtues."
Mario de Valdes y Cocom Copyright 1998
htp
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Nice work TruthandRights but I had already done that, could have save your self a lot time..go back over some old threads of the Moors including some of Egmonds.. Posts: 6546 | From: japan | Registered: Feb 2009
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quote:Originally posted by Recovering Afro-holic: His point was not that he had Black blood. The point he was trying to make was that the man was Black. Here are his own words from the first page of the thread:
"Off course you guys understand that The black boy had a black father and mother as whites do not make white babies. His brother James II and his daughter Anne (a lesbian) were black, his sister maria Henriette Stuart was black and all the women he married and fucked were black. His bastards were black. His cousin The sun king, Louis XIV was black, as were all the Bourbons and Valois kings."
Does that sound like someone who is saying the person had black in his geneology OR the person WAS BLACK?
Just curious dana, did you even bother reading the entire thread?
quote:Originally posted by dana marniche: I think his point is that royalty had black blood in them which is probably true judging from the genealogy, and Europeans have tried to downplay it.
No and no I didn't "bother". Of course, he might be referring to black in the U.S. American or Holland sense but of course that wouldn't mean anything to the rest of the world. So such statements are a bit that is a bit disconcerting. I'm not sure where Egmond is from.
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quote:THANK YOU SO MUCH, DEAR! NOW GO BACK TO SLEEP.
I understand you must be a very young man but show a little more respect that this!
An engraving whether it's a wood engraving or a metal engraving can't act as proofs of a person's colouring of the face.
The engraving of Charles II seems to be poorly done. His features look tumefied and his moustache is hardly even visible. Who's the artist? Can you provide a link to the site where you got this engraving?
All these pics of Obama which you have altered with photoshop (1) techniques are pointless. People in the 16th to 18th centuries hadn't access to these kind of internet techniques.
You talk about about paintings being "whitened". Do you have any evidences of this? If you do have this, how can you know the original complexion of the person in the painting was indeed black? Very white complexion - the kind that only exists in the neighbourhood of the Baltic Sea - was in fashion. It's possible the other Europeans wanted to obtain the same whiteness, that didn't mean their complexion would have been as dark as black, just the kind of white colour you see nowadays in Spain, Italy and so on.
1) Or whatever it's called. I'm too old to know about these techniques of the internet. But the persons discussed here didn't know about them either.
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quote:Originally posted by IronLion: Moamar Ghadaffi is blacker than you will ever be ...
He is a true African hero in a continent interwoven by blood and love
But you can believe what you can until you make the effort to go visit Africa in person.
Not meant for me but I answer anyway.
I lived the first 24 years of my life in Africa. I KNOW what people in Libya and the other North African countries think about the colourings of people from the other Africa. The see us as black apes.
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[Alessandro de Medici, Duke of Florence, was named Il Moro, and his image is used to portray the family's blue blood, instead of a more symbolic, mythical Moor]
[Andrea Mantegna (Isola di Carturo 1431-Mantua 1506) Portrait of an apostolic protonotary, Cardinal Carlo de' Medici 1470 ca.painting on panel; 40.5 x 30.5 cm Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi]
A black is someone who at least looks black and is accepted as black by his black peers. But mostly he self-identifies as black with roots and connections to Africa.
The Moors in western art (1500-1789) are mostly symbols of the black identity of a nation I have described as a fixed mulatto race, with some looking more African, Asian or white, but sharing the same identity, called blue blood. Which I have discovered to be black blood. As blue men was the name for the black Europeans during the medieval period (500-1500).
Some Moors are real persons, as Alessandro de Medici. Then the image of a real person and a family member is used to display the family’s nobility.
They considered the Moor, a classical African, also referred to as ‘a true negro,’ as the source of their blackness. That’s why I have named them a fixed mulatto race, mulatto because of their blackness coming from Africa. And they identified with a black Jesus, god and Maria, because to them black was superior. They looked down on whites, using their hides to bind precious books with. This domination, which made Europe as we know it, is the root for racism against blacks, because they were dominated by these blacks. White Europeans only came into their own, in the second half of the 19th century and after they had wholesale white washed European history. The Great Men of European were originally black and coloured, but became white as a result of 19th century history writing.
A lot of this so-called afrocentrism on British site’s strikes me as assimilated and thus deceitful. Afrocentrism but which does not threaten white supremacy. This is impossible, where I have stated that white supremacy is based on fake, whitened, revisionist portraits of a European elite which was described as black and coloured. Yes we have Charlotte-Sophie Mecklenburg looking classical African with a brown colour, broad nose, thick and prognastic lips and frizzy hair, but then where did her blackness came from? This is never explained, or they come up with something of Alexander Hannibal screwing his was back to Moscow from Paris, and she being his granddaughter.
There is no proof that the Moor in the painting of the Countess of Lichfield is Indian. He resembles her father as a boy, The Black Boy. Yet I’m discussing these things with people who think that a painting is always realistic, that a painter cannot stray from what he has in front of him, that he cannot fantasise a background, a costume or add a fantasy figure like Moor to a painting or render his black and coloured subject as white.
Egmond Codfried is from Surinam, S.A and does his writing and publishing under his real name.
Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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Obama is white, with no damn trace of any blackness, just like all these American crackers and that djehutitrash who soil my thread here! If you are so sure that Charles II Stuart was white, why do you pursue me all the way in Egypt land. Do you think you can stop me from spreading my theories to all the four corners of the world. What kind of fucking nutcase are you? Jeez!
These are the sites which show a whitened Obama and they have nothing to do with me. The sites can be seen when you hit the reply button. If you delete the information after the .com you can visit the site where the images are published. These were made by photoshop but the whitened historical images where made by using white or pink paint instead of brown or black paint. Was it Mondriaan who was chastised for giving us blue trees instead of green trees?
Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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Obama is white, with no damn trace of any blackness, just like all these American crackers and that djehutitrash who soil my thread here! If you are so sure that Charles II Stuart was white, why do you pursue me all the way in Egypt land. Do you think you can stop me from spreading my theories to all the four corners of the world. What kind of fucking nutcase are you? Jeez!
These are the sites which show a whitened Obama and they have nothing to do with me. The sites can be seen when you hit the reply button. If you delete the information after the .com you can visit the site where the images are published. These were made by photoshop but the whitened historical images where made by using white or pink paint instead of brown or black paint. Was it Mondriaan who was chastised for giving us blue trees instead of green trees?
I have no interest in seeing pages of a whitened Obama. Internet techniques have nothing to do with what we're discussing.
1) I ask again: Can you link to the site where you took the engraving of Charles II. I mean the only one where he looks like a coloured man.
2) I ask again: What evidence do you have that the paintings were whitened and how do you know that the original complexions of the people were black?
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quote:Charles' appearance was anything but English, with his sensuous curling mouth, dark complexion, black hair and dark brown eyes, he much resembled his Italian maternal grandmother, Marie de Medici's side of the family. During his escape after the Battle of Worcester, he was referred to as 'a tall, black man' in parliamentary wanted posters. One of the nick-names he acquired was the black boy His height, at six feet two inches, probably inherited from his Danish paternal grandmother, Anne of Denmark, also set him apart from his contemporaries in a time when the average Englishman was far smaller than today.
Citaat: Charles' appearance was anything but English, with his sensuous curling mouth, dark complexion, black hair and dark brown eyes, he much resembled his Italian maternal grandmother, Marie de Medici's side of the family. During his escape after the Battle of Worcester, he was referred to as 'a tall, black man' in parliamentary wanted posters. One of the nick-names he acquired was the black boy His height, at six feet two inches, probably inherited from his Danish paternal grandmother, Anne of Denmark, also set him apart from his contemporaries in a time when the average Englishman was far smaller than
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Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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[Anna Boleyn’s daughter , Queen Elizabeth I, described as 'dark', so this portrat is whitened. She is famous for painting het face white]
ANNA BOLEYN’S APPEARANCE
quote: The Venetian diarist Marino Sanuto, who saw Anne during the meeting between Henry VIII and Francis I of France at Calais in October 1532, described her as "not one of the handsomest women in the world; she is of middling stature, swarthy complexion, long neck, wide mouth, bosom not much raised ... eyes, which are black and beautiful".[26] Simon Grynée wrote to Martin Bucer in September 1531 that Anne was "young, good-looking, of a rather dark complexion". Lancelot de Carles called her "beautiful with an elegant figure", and a Venetian in Paris in 1528 also reported that she was said to be beautiful.[27] Other descriptions of her were less neutral. An observer at her coronation wrote that "the crown became her very ill, and a wart disfigured her very much. She wore a violet velvet mantle, with a high ruff of gold thread and pearls, which concealed a swelling she has, resembling a goitre".[26] The most influential description of Anne, but also the least reliable, was written by the historian and polemicist Nicholas Sanders as late as 1586: "Anne Boleyn was rather tall of stature, with black hair, and an oval face of a sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice. She had a projecting tooth under the upper lip, and on her right hand six fingers. There was a large wen under her chin, and therefore to hide its ugliness she wore a high dress covering her throat ... She was handsome to look at, with a pretty mouth".[28] Sanders' description contributed to what biographer Eric Ives calls the "monster legend" of Anne Boleyn.[29]
quote: In 1532, a new Venetian ambassador described Anne thusly: 'not one of the handsomest women in the world. She is of middling stature, with a swarthy complexion, long neck, wide mouth, bosom not much raised, and in fact has nothing but the King's great appetite, and her eyes, which are black and beautiful - and take great effect on those who served the Queen when she was on the throne. She lives like a queen, and the King accompanies her to Mass - and everywhere.'
Anne Boleyn was very dark. All writers agree on this point. Wyatt says she was "not so whitely as . . . above all we may esteem." Sander said she had a "sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice", and the Venetian ambassador said she had a "swarthy complexion". Dark brown or black hair, along with eyes so dark they were almost black and a very dark skin, combined to make Anne Boleyn conspicuously dark - and the opposite of the contemporary ideal, with golden hair, blue eyes and a pink-and-white complexion. Anne had small breasts, when a voluptuous figure was the ideal. The Venetian ambassador said she was of "middling stature" and Sander said she was "rather tall in stature". One of her favourite chaplains felt that Bessie Blount was more beautiful, although Anne was quite pretty. Much of this lukewarm praise would have been due to the fact that she was the opposite of the aforesaid contemporary ideal.
In all honesty, the following description of Anne Boleyn is ridiculous; the culmination of a legend built up by Roman Catholics who blamed her for the break with Rome. Therefore, it owes much to the deeply ingrained idea that evil people had hideous exteriors, very much like Richard III's alleged hunchback. However, it goes a long way to illuminate the degree to which Anne was slandered long after her death.
Anne Boleyn was rather tall of stature, with black hair and an oval face of sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice. She had a projecting tooth under the upper lip, and on her right hand, six fingers. There was a large wen under her chin, and therefore to hide its ugliness, she wore a high dress covering her throat. In this she was followed by the ladies of the court, who also wore high dresses, having before been in the habit of leaving their necks and the upper portion of their persons uncovered. She was handsome to look at, with a pretty mouth.1
a few indeed were brought to Virginia, by a Dutch ship, as early as 1620;but it was the Royal African Company, that first carried on, from England, a vigorous commerce to Africa, during the reign of Charles II.
page 165 and 166
The adventurers in this trade, who have seen for near a century past, the Society for propagating Christianity, composed of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of London, and many pious doctors of the established church, deriving, as masters, a yearly income from the labor of their Negroe slaves in the West Indies, which is appropriated to the increase of Christianity in the world, could not consider it as contrary to the spirit of the Scriptures, or to the principles of morality: nor could the adventurers regard this traffic as inconsistent with the natural rights of mankind, when they read in the statute of 9 and 10 of King William (which was made avowedly for extending the trade to Africa), "That this trade was highly beneficial to this kingdom;" a declaration of a king, who was the patron of liberty, and of a parliament that had vindicated the natural rights of mankind; and when they read also in the stat. of 23 Geo. II. "That the trade to Africa is very advantageous to Great Britain, and necessary to the plantations," Which act was made by a whig king, and a whig parliament; who, when they dissolved the late African Company, granted a large sum of money as a compensation for their rights, in order that a trade thus necessary and advantageous, might be carried on with greater energy and success.
quote:Originally posted by IronLion: Moamar Ghadaffi is blacker than you will ever be ...
He is a true African hero in a continent interwoven by blood and love
But you can believe what you can until you make the effort to go visit Africa in person.
Not meant for me but I answer anyway.
I lived the first 24 years of my life in Africa. I KNOW what people in Libya and the other North African countries think about the colourings of people from the other Africa. The see us as black apes.
It is not what they think about your colour... It is all about what you know about yur colour!
You sound weak, diffident and despodent No need for that...
Smile for the sun shines And Jah lives...
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quote:Originally posted by markellion: Here is some more royalty for you Egmond Codfried King William "That this trade was highly beneficial to this kingdom;" King George II "That the trade to Africa is very advantageous to Great Britain, and necessary to the plantations," Robert Norris (1791) http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/norris/norris.html [QUOTE]page 162 a few indeed were brought to Virginia, by a Dutch ship, as early as 1620;but it was the Royal African Company, that first carried on, from England, a vigorous commerce to Africa, during the reign of Charles II. page 165 and 166
Whites will even exploit or murder other whites if there is profit in it, so will blacks exploit or murder blacks for the same reason. The fact that black Europeans were involved in slavery does not make them white nor does it disprove my theory. It might be that among the historical European blacks some felt themselves to be Africans, while others regarded themselves as evolved, and Europeans. This might explain why people who I regard as black might have written racist sounding statements about African slaves and their descendents.
Posts: 5454 | From: Holland | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
I've looked at sandersofoxford.com. The engraving of Charles II that you've chosen to show is discernible from the other ingravings on the page not only because of the fact that the face has a darker skin tone than the other engravings of the same person, the background is also darker than on the rest. Therefore it can not be considererd as a proof of any racial background.
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quote:If a person in Europe is called black it's mostly because he has black hair, not that he has black skin.
Dear, I hear this all the time. Would be kinda nice someone would prove this to me, once and for all.
The personal descriptions I use are quite clear about the persons colour or features:
Charles II Stuart: The Black Boy, a tall black man, the swarthy Stuart.
Lorenzo de Medici: dark and swarthy, with a flattened nose.
Queen Anna Boleyn: very dark, with black eyes and dark hair.
Germaine de Staël: too swarthy, bad complexion
James Boswell: swarthy with black eyes and black hair.
Rousseau: a genteel black man in an Armenian coat (Boswell)
Queen Charlotte Sophie of Mecklenburg Strelitz: a true mulatto face, yellow, brown, her mouth was to wide and her nose shows the same fault.
Charles V Habsburg: his mummy was black with massive subnasal prognatism
Louis XIV: mummy black as ink. He was a cousin of Charles II Stuart; the black boy.
Elizabeth I (Boleyns daughter): dark
William of Orange: more brown then white, brown of complexion and the beard.
I don't really see why you have taken this stand??? Both "brown" and "swarthy" are pretty common adjectives to describe a person from the white race.
The Caucasoid, found in Europe, N Africa, and the Middle East to N India, is characterized as pale reddish white to olive brown in skin color, of medium to tall stature, with a long or broad head form. The hair is light blond to dark brown in color, of a fine texture, and straight or wavy. The color of the eyes is light blue to dark brown and the nose bridge is usually high.
Olive, beige, or tan skin (as well as the adjective "swarthy") describes a skin color range of some individuals, who may be of Caucasian, Mediterranean, Asian, and Middle Eastern descent.
posted
ok lets face the truth king chales was not r1b like most europeans in fact i think he was e1b1b1c1a just like william harvey charles ancestor was from brittany just like harvey he descendents from fitzalan a breton who join william the conquer and the normans thats why is facial features are more middle eastern north african regards e1b1b1c1
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