Recently there has been a small cottage industry in finding ancestors of
Euroepan figures who we would identify as "black".  Its easier with royal
families and aristocrats, because of the mania for geneology - for some
periods of time the study of history was they study of geneology - and
because the inter marriages one could list many famous people with a
single ancestor.

Europe was more ethnically unsettled than many people would think -
there was a constant low level migration of people to and from various
places in Europe, in search of better places to make a living.  This can
be documented by a variety of means - following specific geneologies we
find that the first Bach we have knowledge of was from Hungary, by the
introduction of loan words, by modern genetic sampling.  One can also see
it documented in "fairy" tales - that is tales of the sort collected by
Grimm and elaborated on by Anderson.  The trope "and he left to go out
into the world to seek his fortune" is so common, that we forget what it
actually implies in a time when ethnic groups were more localised.

I would not be surprised if one could trace one or more ancestors of
Beethoven who we would label black, on the other hand, I haven't seen
a paper that conclusively documents this either.

Footnote: the belief that Sally Hemming's had children by Jefferson was
quite prevelant long before recent tests indicate that this was so with
a high degree of probability.  And I mean among history professors.  The
washing that "everyone" believed otherwise is a myth.  In a world where I
cannot watch a news program without having someone shill for a junk science
book that just *happens* to be connected to the network the program is on,
this kind of thing is certainly understandable - but it is still a
politicisation of fact...

Stirling Newberry <[log in to unmask]>