The Duke of Richmond is portrayed as grotesque and depraved. The actual Duke of Richmond in 1814 was 50-year-old Charles Lennox, the fourth Duke in the current line. He was handsome (by contemporary as well as modern standards), very athletic (he excelled at cricket, tennis and racket-ball), and apparently happily married to Charlotte Gordon, with whom he had 14 children --- 7 daughters and 7 sons. In the setting of Taboo, the Duke was quite likely not even in London --- at some point during 1814 he moved his family to Brussels (as he was serving in the war against Napoleon), where they stayed until 1818, when he was appointed Governor-General of British North America.
In this episode, a sankofa tattoo is mentioned by Winter. This is a word in the Twi language of Ghana meaning "to retrieve" and also refers to the Bono Adinkra symbol represented either with a stylized heart shape or by a bird with its head turned backwards while its feet face forward carrying a precious egg in its mouth. Sankofa is often associated with the proverb, "Se wo were fi na wosankofa a yenkyi," which translates as: "It is not wrong to go back for that which you have forgotten."
The sankofa bird has also been adopted as an important symbol in an African-American and African Diaspora context to represent the need to reflect on the past to build a successful future.
The sankofa bird has also been adopted as an important symbol in an African-American and African Diaspora context to represent the need to reflect on the past to build a successful future.