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This article argues for an interpretation of black African characters in selected plays of Gil Vicente (c.1470–1536) that resists negative stereotyping of these characters and instead advocates for understanding them as participants in sixteenth-century Portuguese culture in the historical context of the Portuguese presence in Africa. The plays are Frágoa de amor, Clérigo da Beira, and Nau de amores. The article highlights the characteristic Portuguese spoken by black Africans (fala de preto) as being not a racist parody of spoken Portuguese but rather Gil Vicente's linguistically sound inclusion of a historically attested form of Portuguese in his theatrical dialogues. Through this form of speech Vicente explores the social status of Africans and grants them discursive autonomy, including them in the social interactions and comic machinations and criticisms of sixteenth-century Portuguese society staged in the plays.
