"Slavery in fifteenth and sixteenth-century Europe was usually not for life; instead, on the death of a master or mistress, either a slave was freed or a set period of further enslavement was fixed. In Europe, a future freed life for slaves was envisaged, and consequently slaves always lived in hope that they would be freed from bondage. Manumission, or the freeing of slaves, was a distinct probability. The mechanism for this was normally contained in a will, where futures for slaves were mapped out, and where money was bequeathed for marriage, for setting up house, or for enabling a former slave to make a living. Clothes and possessions were also bequeathed. At its simplest and smoothest, therefore, slavery in Europe during the Renaissance can be seen as just a stage in a life and not a life sentence. As a result of this process of being freed within a generation, and of having the possibility of integration, freed and free Africans were socially mobile and very quickly appeared in professional and creative positions in Europe. The late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries saw the first black lawyers, the first black churchmen, the first black schoolteachers, the first black authors, and the first black artists. Superficially at least, the black African depicted in European dress by Jan Mostaert ... had been "Europeanized" through his acquisition of European accessories such as a sword and the hat badge from a Christian shrine, and he may have been an ambassador or held a position at a European court."
Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe, pgs. 13-14.
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See Mostaert's Portrait of a Black Man (Portrait of an African Man) in the following wikipedia article:
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