[27][28] According to the Augustan History, North African Roman emperor Septimius Severus visited Hadrian's Wall in 210 AD, where he was said to have been mocked by an Ethiopian soldier holding a garland of cypress-boughs.

[57] Blackamoor servants were perceived as a fashionable novelty and worked in the households of several prominent Elizabethans, including that of Queen Elizabeth I, William Pole, Francis Drake,[58][59][46] and Anne of Denmark in Scotland.

[64][65][66] Reacting to the darker complexion of people with biracial parentage, George Best argued in 1578 that black skin was not related to the heat of the sun (in Africa) but was instead caused by biblical damnation.

While visiting the English court, Casper Van Senden, a German merchant from Lübeck, requested the permission to transport "Blackamoores" living in England to Portugal or Spain, presumably to sell them there.

[71] In 1601, Elizabeth issued another proclamation expressing that she was "highly discontented to understand the great number of Negroes and blackamoors which (as she is informed) are carried into this realm",[72] and again licensing van Senden to deport them.

[102] Modern historians estimate, based on parish lists, baptismal and marriage registers as well as criminal and sales contracts, that about 10,000 black people lived in Britain during the 18th century.

[114] Marcus Thomas is thought to have been brought at that time from Jamaica as a young boy by the Stanhope family, working as a servant in their home, being baptised age 19, and later joining the Westminster Militia as a drummer.

Thirty years after his 1871 death, the chaplain of the Showman's Guild said: "In the great brotherhood of the equestrian world there is no colour line [bar], for, although Pablo Fanque was of African extraction, he speedily made his way to the top of his profession.

He was defeated, leading the leader of the Conservative Party, Lord Salisbury to remark that "however great the progress of mankind has been, and however far we have advanced in overcoming prejudices, I doubt if we have yet got to the point of view where a British constituency would elect a Blackman".

Many Blacks from the Caribbean and West Africa arrived in small groups as wartime workers, merchant seamen, and servicemen from the army, navy, and air forces.

[161] Among those from the Caribbean who joined the Royal Air Force (RAF) and gave distinguished service are Ulric Cross[162] from Trinidad, Cy Grant[163] from Guyana and Billy Strachan[164] from Jamaica.

In London, 1981 brought further conflict, with a perceived racist police force after the death of 13 black youngsters who were attending a birthday party that ended in the devastating New Cross Fire.

[184] Despite the recommendations of the Scarman Report (published in November 1981),[181] relations between black youths and police did not significantly improve and a further wave of nationwide conflicts occurred in Handsworth, Birmingham, in 1985, when the local South Asian community also became involved.

Documents from the National Archives show that practices continued into the 1960s, with Manchester police creating reports on immigrant communities' "intermixing, miscegenation and illegitimacy", listing numbers of children by race.

[3] The ten local authorities with the largest proportion of people who identified as Black were all located in London: Lewisham (26.77%), Southwark (25.13%), Lambeth (23.97%), Croydon (22.64%), Barking and Dagenham (21.39%), Hackney (21.09%), Greenwich (20.96%), Enfield (18.34%), Haringey (17.58%) and Brent (17.51%).

[249] Historian Winston James argues that the experience of racism in Britain was a major factor in the development of a shared Caribbean identity amongst black immigrants from a range of different island and class backgrounds.

The project also notes that the British school system "has been indicted on numerous occasions for racism, and for undermining the self-confidence of black children and maligning the culture of their parents".

[282] In November 2009, the Home Office published a study that showed that, once other variables had been accounted for, ethnicity was not a significant predictor of offending, anti-social behaviour or drug abuse among young people.

[290][291] For some key health measures, including life expectancy, general mortality and many of the leading causes of death in the UK, black Britons have better outcomes than their white British counterparts.

Vaccine hesitancy was driven by unethical health treatments towards black people in the past, with many surveyed citing the Tuskegee Syphilis Study in the United States as an example.

[316] Well-known black Britons living before the 20th century include the Chartist William Cuffay; William Davidson, who was executed as a Cato Street conspirator; Olaudah Equiano (also called Gustavus Vassa), a former slave who bought his freedom, moved to England, and settled in Soham, Cambridgeshire, where he married and wrote an autobiography, dying in 1797; Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, pioneer of the slave narrative; and Ignatius Sancho, a grocer who also acquired a reputation as a man of letters.

[333][334][335][336] Other mixed-race descendants of British nobles include the philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah (who is the great-grandson of Charles Cripps, 1st Baron Parmoor),[337] the actor Adetomiwa Edun (who is the aforementioned Lord Parmoor's great-great-grandson),[338][339] the writer James Forman Jr. (who is the great-grandson of David Freeman-Mitford, 2nd Baron Redesdale),[340] the actress Lady Naomi Gordon-Lennox (the adopted daughter of Charles Gordon-Lennox, 10th Duke of Richmond),[341] and the models Adwoa and Kesewa Aboah (who are the great-granddaughters of Anthony Lowther, Viscount Lowther).

Other high-profile television personalities and entertainers include comedian Sir Lenny Henry, Rudolph Walker, Joseph Marcell, Nabil Elouahabi and chef Ainsley Harriott.

Marsha Ambrosius, Joan Armatrading, Pato Banton, Dame Shirley Bassey, Mel B, Alexandra Burke, Celeste, Diane Charlemagne, Taio Cruz, Craig David, Des'ree, Fleur East, Estelle, Gabrielle, Roland Gift, Jaki Graham, David Grant, Eddy Grant, Pauline Henry, Dev Hynes, Jamelia, KSI, Leona Lewis, Lianne La Havas, Shaznay Lewis, Mahalia, Ella Mai, MNEK, Maxine Nightingale, Billy Ocean, Mica Paris, Leigh-Anne Pinnock, Maxi Priest, Corinne Bailey Rae, Andrew Roachford, Sade, Emeli Sande, Seal, Skepta, Heather Small, Jorja Smith, 21 Savage, Digga D, Benji Webbe, Simon Webbe, Caron Wheeler, and Young MC are among the popular singers not mentioned in the music section above.

[348] The most prominent Black British filmmaker is Sir Steve McQueen, who after initially receiving acclaim as a visual artist and winning the Turner Prize in 1999, went on to direct his first feature Hunger (2008), which earned him the Caméra d'Or at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.

Black British actors are also increasingly found starring in major Hollywood films, notable examples include Kingsley Ben-Adir, John Boyega, Franz Drameh, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Cynthia Erivo, David Harewood, Naomie Harris, Paterson Joseph, Daniel Kaluuya, Adrian Lester, Delroy Lindo, Lashana Lynch, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Thandiwe Newton, Sophie Okonedo, Eunice Olumide, David Oyelowo, Aaron Pierre, Hugh Quarshie, Maisie Richardson-Sellers, Colin Salmon, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Antonia Thomas, Eamonn Walker, Ashley Walters, and Letitia Wright.

Looking to join the listed above are young stars such as Ricardo P. Lloyd who spoke about the challenges many black British actors face in the UK industry compared to the US in an article by The Independent.

[350][351] Among notable Black British visual artists are painters such as Chris Ofili, Frank Bowling, Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Keith Piper, Sonia Boyce, Paul Dash, Kimathi Donkor, Claudette Johnson, Winston Branch, Lina Iris Viktor Pogus Caesar; sculptors including Sokari Douglas Camp, Ronald Moody, Fowokan, Yinka Shonibare, Hew Locke and Zak Ové[citation needed]; designers including Yinka Ilori, Samuel Ross, Mac Collins, and the architect David Adjaye.

There are many notable black British footballers, some of whom have played for England, including Reece James, Tammy Abraham, Fikayo Tomori, Marcus Rashford, Paul Ince, Sol Campbell, John Barnes, Dion Dublin, Rio Ferdinand, Viv Anderson, Des Walker, Ashley Cole, Ian Wright, Daniel Sturridge, Daniel Welbeck, Joe Gomez, Micah Richards, Bukayo Saka, Raheem Sterling, Jesse Lingard, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Danny Rose, Ryan Bertrand, Kyle Walker, Dele Alli and David James.

He topped the 2007 Powerlist as the most powerful Black male in the United Kingdom by New Nation magazine and was appointed to then Prime Minister Gordon Brown's business advisory panel.