TUDOR LONDON: A GLOBAL CITY

During the 16th century, London opened its doors to a diverse cast of newcomers, from Moroccan ambassadors to Native American chiefs. Jerry Brotton reveals how foreign visitors shaped the Tudor capital

- Jerry Brotton

On 2 October 1586, a rather unusual baptism took place at St Katharine’s Church next to the Tower of London. The person being baptised, known as “Chinano the Turk”, was a 40-year-old native of the Mediterranean island of Euboea – and the first known male Muslim convert to Protestantism.

The celebrant at the conversion of Chinano – probably a clumsy Anglicisation of the Turkish name Sinan – was Welsh minister Meredith Hanmer. Earlier that day, he had preached a sermon entitled “The Baptising of a Turke”, informing the congregation that Chinano had been taken captive as a galley slave by the Spanish, then shipped to Cartagena in what’s now Colombia. There he was “liberated” by Sir Francis Drake in 1586, along with another hundred Turks, and brought back to London. Hanmer announced that Chinano had “renounced Mahomet” and “desired he might be received as one of the faithful Christians, and be baptised”.

What happened to Chinano and those other Turks is unknown, because they disappear from the historical record. But their brief appearance gives us an insight into the global world in which Tudor London played its part, and the sheer variety of people from outside England who ended up living, working, marrying, having children and dying in the city.