Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of I Heart Radio and Grim and Myelt from Aaron

Manky.

Listener discretion is advised.

In 1771, the London Stock Exchange introduced a betting pool at three two odds that the notorious

cultural figure, the Shevalier Dio, whose long resume on to that point included stints

as a diplomat, spy, soldier, and political writer, was, biologically, a woman.

This was an actual betting pool that people bet actual money on.

The interest in the Shevalier Dio's genitalia became so frenzied that for a period of time,

the young couldn't leave her home without armed guards because of all the strangers who

were trying to physically rip her clothes off and expose whatever was beneath, presumably

to their financial advantage.

After a year, the betting pool was abandoned because no progress was made on actually coming

up with a determination that was deemed satisfactory.

If you can possibly believe it, Dio wasn't willing to undergo a public physical examination.

But Dio's gender expression became such a topic of public interest in the 18th century

that the court of the King's Bench, England, and then ultimately the French government,

would weigh in to issue formal declarations that she was, in fact, a woman and would

and should be publicly treated as such.

The Shevalier Dio is one of history's most compelling and confounding figures, sometimes

regarded as a protoqueer figure, the namesake for a number of groups that support the transgender

community.

She is sometimes incorrectly recognized as the first openly transgender person in Europe.

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