Review

‘That rare thing: a book about the 16th century that said something new.’

(Evening Standard, Books of the Year)

‘Splendid…that rare thing – a work of history about the Tudors that actually says something fresh and new…a cracking contribution to the field.’

(Dan Jones, Sunday Times)

‘Enlightening and constantly surprising… Far too many popular studies of the Tudors return the same faces. To its great credit, Black Tudors presents fresh figures and challenges the way we look at them.’

(Jessie Childs, Financial Times)

‘Consistently fascinating, historically invaluable…the narrative is pacy, the research sympathetically thorough.. Anyone reading it will never look at Tudor England in the same light again'.

(Daily Mail)

‘[The] audience will find itself in the hands of a historian of excellent investigative skills, who shows attention to detail, uses evidence with appropriate caution, and has the sensibility of a scholar.’

(Times Literary Supplement)

‘The industry and skill with which Miranda Kaufmann has hunted for these sources and teased out their meanings are exemplary… Kaufmann’s greatest skill is her ability to fill in the background on every topic that arises, from piracy to silk-weaving to brothels to Anglo-Moroccan diplomacy…In the hands of a lesser writer this would be mere padding with secondary material, but she investigates every subject in the same depth… a fascinating book, which brings a sadly neglected part of our history to life, and grinds no ideological axes in the process’.

(Daily Telegraph)

‘Both an eye-opener and a good read.’

(Sorted)

‘Miranda Kaufmann writes engagingly as she reveals the untold stories of Africans who lived free, worked for wages, married and died in 16^th and 17^th century England.’

(CHOICE)

‘Fascinating.’

(Sunday Telegraph)

‘Meticulous research draws on sources from letters to legal papers…The detail [Kaufmann] unearths brings to life those absent from the pages of history.’

(Observer)

About the Author

Miranda Kaufmann is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of London’s Institute of Commonwealth Studies. Her first book, Black Tudors, was shortlisted for the Wolfson History Prize 2018. She has appeared on Sky News, the BBC and Al Jazeera, and she’s written for The Times, Guardian and BBC History Magazine. She lives in Pontblyddyn in North Wales.