The Tudor painting with an enslaved black presence

Charlecote Park, a 16th-century country house, stands in Charlecote, near Wellesbourne, England, about 4 miles east of Stratford-upon-Avon and 5.5 miles south of Warwick. It has been under the care of the National Trust since 1946. The park covers 185 acres, backing onto the River Avon. The house was originally built by Sir Thomas Lucy in 1558, with Queen Elizabeth I herself staying in one of the rooms. However, the present house dates mostly from the 19th century, having been altered by various generations of the Lucy family over the centuries.

It is classified as a Grade I listed building and is open to the public. In the Tudor great hall hangs what is believed to be one of the earliest depictions of an enslaved black person in the West Midlands. A young black groom dressed in a blue livery coat and red stockings can be seen in the right-hand background, wearing a gleaming metal collar around his neck. The National Trust notes that ‘It is not known if Kneller painted this unidentified figure from a model or if it is a portrait of a real groom in Captain Lucy’s household'.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons