Transgender history in the United Kingdom

People dressing and living differently from their sex assignment at birth and contributing to various aspects of British history and culture have been documented from the 14th century to the present day.

Transgender History in Britain is long and complex, and does not always conform to the same modern or medical definition, with gender roles frequently changing during the first millennium CE under varying ruling groups such as the Celts, Romans and Anglo-Saxons.

These patriarchal ideas emerged with the cultural and legal implications of the Roman conquest of Britain and resumed in English practices and identity.

At the time, the term hermaphrodite or less frequently androgyny was used to refer to transgender, non-binary and queer peoples during the medieval Early Modern English period.

Medieval Welsh and French literature such as the Mabinogion mentions the story of Gilfaethwy and Gwydion, and Le Roman de Silence which also contain Transgender themes, but often perpetuate the idea of gender conformity and only returning to one's sex assignment at birth.

[11] Crossdressing in silent films began when Charlie Chaplin and Stan Laurel took the tradition of female impersonation in the English music halls when they went to North America in 1910.

In 21st-century retellings, reworking and reappraisal in queer theory of old folklore and mythology such as Tam Lin and Hervor, plays such as As You Like It and works of science fiction have also been popular as an emerging form of trans literature.

[28] In 1812, surgeon James Miranda Barry was found to be biologically female on examination at death and the infamous Boulton and Park case in 1870 took place under heightened Victorian societal legal and moral pressure on transgender peoples, both being acquitted in 1871.

In the 1960s and 1970s, designers like Michael Fish began to promote androgynous fashion, which were made popular by musicians such as Mick Jagger, David Bowie and Freddie Mercury.

Hall is likely to have been intersex as they were ordered by the Virginia court to wear both men's breeches and a woman's apron and cap simultaneously by John Pott.