Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Shakespeare was from the Tudor period, not the Middle Ages.
But yes, Europeans did know about black people and Arabs. Maybe not average British peasant, but the Spanish, Vikings and the French certainly did.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

 Bronzefists42 wrote:
I know I'm not innocent in this matter but how exactly did all these weird theories about the "superior warrior gender." Get here?

Because people have bizarre ideas about gender, treating men and women as if they're entirely different species.

Patrilineal descent. Most of it starts there.

Mn, possibly. A lot of traditions are very illogical when looked at them from outside the perspective of the culture in which the tradition is fostered.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Shakespeare was from the Tudor period, not the Middle Ages.

Yeah, I know, but I somehow doubt that people that think there were no black people during the middle-age do believe there were many of them during the Tudor period.

I remember reading this article about black people in England:
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18903391

What about the rough riders? They have a middle eastern complexion at least and I would give some of them black complexions myself (if I knew how)

Rough Riders are based off the mongols, who while not 'white', are fair-skinned.

Well, I see a lot of of strange arguments... Let me add my 5 cents to them:
1) No black people in 40k. So who can be considered black? Is Beyonce black? Yes. But I have some female friends who look very much like her in terms of skin-, eye- and haircolor, but they are white. So where is the line where you stop being white and become black? There isn't such a line. Besides, ever heard of the One Drop Rule? You can be black even if you have blond hair, blue eyes and fair skin because you have a black great-great-grandfather. Same goes for asian and native american people. Brandon Lee looked like a european male, yet he would be concidered asian.
2) Women make better soldiers than men. I strongly disagree. 20% more pain resistance? In what units do you mesure pain to make such a conclusion? There can't be such a thin as 20% more pain resistance, beacause the pain threshold is purely individual and varies greatly even among females. Stronger stress resistance? To routenly stress - yes, to extraordinary - no. Men are better at dealing with stress in combat situations, while women are more prone to having panick attacks. There was also the fact that strength does not matter past a certain level. Yes, after 100 kg every hit can put your lights out. The problem is that there are next to no women who can reach this level of functional body mass, while most man can. Men also run faster due to tha fact that speed depends on the strength of your muscles. And one more thing - reaction speed. Men react faster due to the nature of the male nerval system and that gives a great advantage in a combat situation. Most differences lie on a hormonal level an that can't be changed by even the most advanced technoligies.
3) Every race in 40k is based on a cultural concept from Earth and can be considered racist. Eldar - Japaneese-style elusive mynja-samurai peril. Tau - asian anime fan-comunists. Necrons - evil ancient agyptian mummy-robots. Orks - redneck/soccer-football hooligans/irish/russian drunkards. If you want to, you can find a reason to be offended. But that is the main reason why people (at least over here in Post-Soviet countries) love the fluff of Warhammer 40k - it's not some politicaly correct garbage, it's GRIMDARK! There is no place for such things here, because you play a game where Mankind is united into a fascistic, totalitarian, teocratic and xenophobic oppression machine and everybody wants to destroy anyone.
P.S.: sorry if I made any mistakes

This thread continues to be a chalice for unsourced bullgak over and over and over again. Wonder how much more it can hold.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
Rough Riders are based off the mongols, who while not 'white', are fair-skinned.

Mn, my racist grandparents would have said they're "yellow", but well, racist.

Wasn't one of the Remembrancers black in the HH opening trilogy? I seem to remember that she had some kind of infatuation with Loken. I'm sure I recall her description as having a skull that had an elongated conical-like shape to the rear where augmentation were. If I'm wrong let me know.

For the emperor's sake people if we're talking races here there's an entire imperial guard regiment in the book legion who i can only assume are some sort of Indian, Eurasian, etc. So yes, the Imperium are quite ethnically diverse.

 Muhr wrote:
Wasn't one of the Remembrancers black in the HH opening trilogy? I seem to remember that she had some kind of infatuation with Loken. I'm sure I recall her description as having a skull that had an elongated conical-like shape to the rear where augmentation were. If I'm wrong let me know.

No, you are quite correct. I started listening to the unabridged audiobook just this week.

Mersadie Oliton is described as you say.

mhacdebhandia wrote:

There were a lot more people in "Dark Ages" Europe who would be considered non-white by 21st century standards than people seem to think. It's not like Europe forgot Africa existed in between the Roman Empire and the early modern colonial era.

I think I know what you mean about Europe but Africa was pretty much lost to Europe once the muslims conquered it. You actually had things the other way with most of Spain being under muslim control for hundreds of years, the muslims being part of a larger North African empire.

 Jollydevil wrote:

 CommandPoint wrote:
As far as Space Marines go, isn't it because they are all clones from one person, the Emporer.

For the purpose of sex, yes, only males can become Space Marines. But as for race, recruits are taken from varying home-worlds across the universe and basically implanted with the genes of the emprah. So if a space marine is black at birth, he stays black.

I thought all Raven Guard were albino white like Salamanders are all pitch black. Skin colour is controlled by melamine so it's not hard to think that the organ they get that allows marines to control colour can make their skin all one colour. Which means that for fully working marines, all of them while out of armour could have dark skin if they wanted.

As a little bit of trivia, I paint around 1/4 of my Guardsmen as black. Why? It's the ratio of black to whites per squad in Aliens.

Computron wrote:

 Jollydevil wrote:

 CommandPoint wrote:
As far as Space Marines go, isn't it because they are all clones from one person, the Emporer.

For the purpose of sex, yes, only males can become Space Marines. But as for race, recruits are taken from varying home-worlds across the universe and basically implanted with the genes of the emprah. So if a space marine is black at birth, he stays black.

I thought all Raven Guard were albino white like Salamanders are all pitch black. Skin colour is controlled by melamine so it's not hard to think that the organ they get that allows marines to control colour can make their skin all one colour. Which means that for fully working marines, all of them while out of armour could have dark skin if they wanted.

Thats where things start to get iffy. Some places will tell you that marines skin tones are specifically changed in the creation of a space marine process. But at the same time we know that marines taken from different homeworlds have different skin tones.
So... Yeh

 Jollydevil wrote:

Computron wrote:

 Jollydevil wrote:

 CommandPoint wrote:
As far as Space Marines go, isn't it because they are all clones from one person, the Emporer.

For the purpose of sex, yes, only males can become Space Marines. But as for race, recruits are taken from varying home-worlds across the universe and basically implanted with the genes of the emprah. So if a space marine is black at birth, he stays black.

I thought all Raven Guard were albino white like Salamanders are all pitch black. Skin colour is controlled by melamine so it's not hard to think that the organ they get that allows marines to control colour can make their skin all one colour. Which means that for fully working marines, all of them while out of armour could have dark skin if they wanted.

Thats where things start to get iffy. Some places will tell you that marines skin tones are specifically changed in the creation of a space marine process. But at the same time we know that marines taken from different homeworlds have different skin tones.
So... Yeh

The Marines actually have an organ that lets them change their skin-tones

Well, technically it just regulates the levels of melanin, and the side effect darkens the skin to protect better against solar radiation. The Marines can't actually control it.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2671032/#S9title

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Well, technically it just regulates the levels of melanin, and the side effect darkens the skin to protect better against solar radiation. The Marines can't actually control it.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2671032/#S9title

Which reminds me of some milk bottles you can get which are a solid white colour and triple coated or somesuch to keep the sun off your milk. Sun apparently breaks milk down. The thing is, who leaves their milk in the sun for that to happen. The bottle goes from the shop to your car to your fridge - then you drink it. It's barely in the sun.
When are space marines exposed to solar radiation?
It's not like they take long walks by the beach on a regular basis. They spend most of their time inside a ship, a building and of course their armour.

Computron has clearly never had a milkman.

Yeah. In some country, this does not even exist! For instance, I do not think it exists in France.

I hear tell in the Northern Waste there be milk in bags. But this is legend.

Not sure if it has been mentioned in the thread already but for the cover art of Legacies of Betrayal, there is a Death Guard character who is black; he's in the middle, to the left of Kharn.

 Gogsnik wrote:
Not sure if it has been mentioned in the thread already but for the cover art of Legacies of Betrayal, there is a Death Guard character who is black; he's in the middle, to the left of Kharn.

Spoiler:

Good god those Space Marines look fethed up. This is why I like the blood angels.

I think it's indicative of the people playing. I like painting some diversity into my armies because I think it looks cooler. Fluff wise though there are examples of non-whites.
The people of nocturne are implied to resemble sub Saharan African people's.
The white scars are obviously Asian steppe people's.
Coraxs people are Native American.
I think it's also the space panthers or something that are "black"
It's there people just need to tap into it.

@Mordred

I completly agree with you. 40K fluff does show quite a bit of diversity and many people armies do show this trend. It could have more, but still has quite a few exemples. I think we can say that despite all its monstruous characteristics, The Imperium is neither racist (there seems to be various ethnic group even at the highest ranks) neither mysoginous or mysandrous (for the exact same reason). The problem I can see though is that the model range offered by GW at the moment is poor when it comes to represent that diversity.

Their painting guide, a excellent book and DVD if you are a noob at painting models, offers no tutorial for non-white skin people. Of course, you can explore a few avenues to do it and its entirely possible with their painting range. Despite the presence of female stormtroopers, guardsmen and commissars, it still impossible to buy a GW product to represent any of these, other company can sell you look alike if you search a little, but some store may refuse you the right to play that army if let say 50% of the models aren't GW product. I think we need more diversity in the product we buy and GW should really takle the issue.

Pasty white dudes in Nottingham England inventing a boardgame. Thats the start of it. Most of the fans are like that as well, yours truly included. Plus it didn't get better that the Salamanders mutated into being scary black men. Remind me again, who invented that gak about the Salamanders again?

I mean I was all for them being black from the get-go. Not just turning black. Who wrote that again? Adolf Hitler?

I think they are African in apperNce but when the gene seed mutates them it's effected by the planets radiation and it gets even darker and their eyes turn red. But they are the most humanitarian of the space marines so they are no monsters.

They are supposed to be the nicest Space Marine-chapter. Though I personally think that's the Imperial Fists since they don't take personal command of warzones and only advice. Of course the Salamanders gets bonus points for sticking around regular human beings. But it was their geneseed now unfortunately that mutated them into scary black men. Of course I doesn't like that one bit.

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Shakespeare was from the Tudor period, not the Middle Ages.

Yeah, I know, but I somehow doubt that people that think there were no black people during the middle-age do believe there were many of them during the Tudor period.

I remember reading this article about black people in England:
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18903391

Yes, there was the occasional black person in Europe during the Middle Ages, but they were so few and rare that it is rather insignificant. They were mostly individuals brought to Europe by wealthy traders as a rarity to gawk at.
Most other people described as "black" would not be really considered black by modern standards. They were people like Moors, Arabs and Persians, who visited Europe as traders. They were described as "black" because their skin was much darker than what Europeans are used to, similar to how in Russia, Caucasians are sometimes called black. They are not really black like Africans are black (and even Africans are brown rather than really black).

Black people brought to Europe were mostly as slaves. But they didn't tend to be bred though they might at some level have contributed to the darker Caucasian people. Most research about the matter is done by pasty white guys from England. The black comments were in accordance to pasty white Europeans saw the darker Hispanics and such. But I think Iron_Captain made excellent points there.

Why is this even a thread...