Academic tells story of first Japanese to come to England

Fascinating.

A book to put on the list of TODOs.

Sounds like an adventure that Voltaire would have been proud to have written.

Make a great film or TV series.

The two Japanese men, thought to be slaves, were brought to England by explorer Thomas Cavendish along with booty from a Spanish ship he looted off the coast of what is now Mexico in 1587.

basically summed up the history of the world outside europe from the 16th to early 20th century.

Fascinating, I think I have previously heard mention of these two before. Will be very interested to read the book.

I thought the Silk Road (114BCE) saw many different cultures and people coming to Europe including the UK?

The then-city-state of Venice controlled the European side of the Silk Road. To keep Venice's advantage, that trade route and its secrets would had been jealously guarded by the Venetians and not freely shared with others

In fact, that Venetian eastward land-route control was a big part why Spain and Portugal wanted a westward sea route to East Asia and break free from Venice's trade monopoly

Meanwhile, the "UK" was kinda literally its own island back then - not really a traveler's destination

All I'm saying is I don't believe they were the first Japanese to cross the British Channel.

It's not impossible. But it took Marco Polo years to go from Venice to China - Japan to the British isle would've been a bit longer. There would've been enough documentation of such a long eye-opening journey.

Lamilly:

They may have meant the kingdom of England. Japanese (and other asians) may have come to the kingdom of Kent or Wessex, or the Iceni tribal village of Aelfwald.

Portuguese slaves, not English. Yes, england did employ slaves and did not abolish til 1833, but here the English capn captured them. So, more like prisoners than slaves under the English (doubt they could've gone home straight away).

That was for kentarogaijin, not the story. Sorry.