The Tudors Dynasty Podcast.

Hello and welcome back to the Tudor's Dynasty and Beyond.

This is Dr. Emma, spinning for your regular host, Rebecca.

Daito Elizabeth Bell and Sophia Duleep Singh were two extraordinary women with royal heritage who navigated complex histories.

Dido, born to a Sikh prince and an enslaved African woman, grew up in England under the

garden ship of Long Landsfield, where she became a symbol of race and freedom.

Sophia was a daughter of Maharaja Duleep Singh, and she was a strong advocate for women's

and Indian rights.

She fought for women suffragette in Britain and voting rights for women in India, using

her royal status to challenge societal norms.

Both women fought for justice and equality in their respective worlds.

Dido Elizabeth Bell, born in the early 1760s, came into the world under extraordinary and

complex circumstances. She was the daughter of Captain John Lindsay of the Royal Navy and Maria Bell,

an African woman enslaved

in the West Indies. Their paths crossed when Lindsay's ship captured a Spanish vessel in the Caribbean,

and Maria Bell was amongst those on board. While the details of their relationship remain unclear,

it's believed Lindsay entered a union with Maria under the custom of

Plaasage, an informal arrangement between European men and women of African descent.

As a child, Dido spent time with her father in Spanish-controlled Pensacola, Florida, during his

naval posting there in the mid-1760s. But her story would soon shift to a

far different setting, England. Lindsay brought her back to London and entrusted her care to his uncle,

William Murray, the first Earl of Mansfield and his wife. The Murrays, who are already raising their

...