u/Kurotoki52

In 1512, Blanke submitted a formal petition to Henry VIII requesting a higher paying position that had become vacant after another royal trumpeter died. At the time, Blanke earned 8 pence per day, while the vacant position paid 16 pence per day. Henry VIII personally approved the petition, effectively doubling Blanke's wages.

The timing is especially interesting because Blanke had recently married. Around the same time, Henry VIII gave him an unusually generous wedding gift that included expensive cloth, furs, scarlet hose, a hat, a bonnet, and tailoring.

John Blanke is also significant because he is the earliest known Black person in Britain to appear in both surviving historical records and an identifiable portrait. He is depicted on horseback in the famous Westminster Tournament Roll of 1511, celebrating the tournament held for the birth of Prince Henry.

The original Westminster Tournament Roll is preserved at the College of Arms in London. Because it is an exceptionally fragile and light sensitive manuscript measuring more than 18 meters, or about 60 feet, in length, it is only rarely displayed to the public.

I learned about Blanke’s story while traveling to London with an orchestra group I’m part of in New York. I’ve been playing the trumpet for 25 years (since I was 5), and our music conductor introduced us to Blanke’s story and showed us where the Westminster Tournament Roll is located. Apparently, the roll is extremely fragile due to its age and the many years it has spent being preserved.

Lucky enough to see this one in person today (kitchen maid with supper at emmaus) and the way it foregrounds the domestic (and female and black) and pushes Christ back into the corner really struck me as something truly special. It doesn’t even really downplay it. It works as something spiritual floating over her real life and it also works at asking questions which presumably wouldn’t have been that easy to ask in the Spain of his day.

Plus it’s just amazing use of the canvas and the eye and everything else he’s so good at

“Having escaped a French colony in Latin America, Pierre Alexandre fled to Sweden. He worked in the harbors and, when the docks froze over in the winter, modeled at the art academy. Alexandre may have been the only Black person many of the art students knew. They often used costumes and props to cast him in exotic poses.

But in this portrait, young Karin Bergöö, one of the few women students at the academy, captures Alexandre's individuality. Because he is close to the picture plane, he feels physically present, even if his far-off gaze suggests his mind is elsewhere.”

(Currently hanging in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, USA)

Yaa Asantewaa (1840 - 1921) was the queen mother of the Ashanti / Asante empire, now Ghana. She was nominated by her brother Nana Akwasi Afrane Okpase, the ruler of the empire. She is best known for leading what is now known as the war of the golden stool. It actually amounted to a war of resistance against the British colonials.

The golden stool was (and still is) a sacred object for the Ashanti people, a symbol of the divine blessing on their ruler. No one sat on it or used it as a throne but it signified the empire itself. When her bother died, Yaa nominated her grandson as was her right but the British governor exiled him to Seychelles. She then became the regent of her brother's traditional domain.

But then the governor demanded the golden stool itself as a move to usurp the empire. This could not be allowed under any circumstances. No foreigner could have the sacred stool, so Yaa gathered the regent kings and said that the sacred object was only money for the white man but she wouldn't pay them a dime. She said if they couldn't fight this, they should exchange their loincloth for her underwear.

All the regional kings then chose her as their leader, a first for any woman. From March 1900, the rebellion laid siege to the British fort at Kumasi under her lead. The fort still stands today as a Military Museum. Eventually the Gold Coast governor sent a force of 1400 to quell the rebellion. During the fighting, Queen Yaa Asantewaa and fifteen of her closest advisers were captured and exiled to Seychelles. By then, 2000 Asante and 1000 British were dead.

After this the Asante empire was annexed and it became a British protectorate. But when they demanded the golden stool, the real one was hidden and a copy was handed over. Some 20 years later a group of black railway workers discovered and vandalized the real stool, after which they were all judged and executed by the Asante. At this point the British realized what the Asante could do for it and gave up their quest for the sacred object.

Nana Yaa Asantewaa died in exile in the Seychelles on 17 October 1921. Three years after her death, King Prempeh I and the other remaining members of the exiled Asante court were allowed to return. King Prempeh I ensured that the remains of Yaa Asantewaa and the other exiled royals were returned for a proper royal burial. The sacred stool is still used as a symbol to coronate Asante kings and Yaa Asantewaa is highly venerated as the leader who stood up and led the entire nation against white colonials.