People You Never Thought Were of Color

Alessandro de Medici (1510-1537): The first duke of Florence, de Medici, known as “the Moor,” was what we have to call an African-Italian. His mother was a black peasant from Colle Vecchio who worked for a relative of Pope Clement VI.

Aleksander Sergeyevich Pushkin (1799-1837): The father of Russian literature, Pushkin was descended on his mother’s side from Abraham Petrovich Hannibal, known as “the Negro of Peter the Great.” The Shakespeare of his country, this superb poet created the Russian literary language.

Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870): The producer of more literary works than any writer in history, among them The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo.

Robert Browning (1812-1889): One of England’s greatest poets, Browning was the dark-skinned son of a Creole woman from the Caribbean island of St. Kitts.

Source: The African-American Book of Lists compiled by Michael E. Livingston.