Dido, painted here with her cousin Elizabeth, was raised in an aristocratic family in Georgian Britain
When Misan Sagay stumbled into the wrong room in Scone Palace, she encountered a painting which would change her life.
Two young women stared out of the frame at her. One was fair-skinned, the other Black. Misan, a medical student at the University of St Andrews, momentarily forgot about the party she was meant to be at just corridors away.
‘They were equals in that painting,’ Misan would later say. ‘I was struck, intrigued.’
Years later, she returned to Scone Palace to find the portrait had been moved to a more prominent room and the names ‘Dido and Elizabeth’ added below.
Misan delved further into the fascinating history of Dido – an illegitimate, mixed-race woman who held her own in British aristocracy – and created a screenplay for the movie ‘Belle’, released in 2013, while working for the NHS.
The story of Dido had reached a new audience who were eager to find out more.
‘The old world meeting the new’
Dido’s portrait is on display in Scone Palace in Perth, Scotland where (left) Viscount Stormont, William Murray, lives with his family
Visitors to Scone Palace in Scotland, of which there are 100,000 a year, walk in the footsteps of pagan leaders and Christian kings. It’s where the first Scottish Parliament was held and is the original home to the Stone of Destiny, an ancient block of red sandstone used to crown the likes of Macbeth and Robert the Bruce.
Viscount Stormont William Murray lives on the estate with his wife Charlotte Clune and their 14-month-old son. The aristocrat meets Metro on a crisp autumn day; with dog Filo at his feet.
After pleasantries are exchanged, he heads towards the Ambassador’s Room where the painting of Dido and her cousin Elizabeth can be found beside a canopied bed and antique table.
‘Elizabeth is wearing an old-school dress, one heavily corseted which wouldn’t have been commonly worn at the time this was painted – in the early 1770s,’ the Viscount, 35, tells Metro as he looks at the painting. ‘She’s holding a heavy book and in a fixed position. She represents the old world and Old England.
‘Whereas Dido’s dress is almost moving, she’s in a much more flowing position. She wears a turban with an ostrich feather and holds a bowl of fruit; it’s the new world she represents. With Elizabeth reaching out to Dido, you have the old world meeting the new.’
Who was Dido Belle?
Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Dido in the 2013 film Belle (Picture: Bfi/Pinewood/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock)
Born in 1761, Dido was the daughter of Admiral Sir John Lindsay, a British Navy captain who sailed in the Caribbean, and an African slave named Maria Belle.
Young Dido was sent to London to live with Sir John’s uncle, the 1st Earl of Mansfield, and his wife Elizabeth Finch. Meanwhile Maria was sent to America, where she lived in a Florida home paid for by Captain Lindsay. Why the mother and daughter were separated, historians …read more
Source:: Metro
