What is Heathcliff’s ethnicity?

Heathcliff’s ethnicity in the novel Wuthering Heights (1847) is unknown and only guessed at by the book’s other characters. As a child he was found on the streets of Liverpool by Mr. Earnshaw and named Heathcliff for the Earnshaws’ son by that name who died young. Various characters guess him to be a “gipsy” (Roma), Indian, Chinese, American, or Spanish. Because he is described as having black hair, black eyes, and dark skin, and because Liverpool was a port city that served as a center of the transatlantic slave trade between West Africa and the West Indies, many scholars think Heathcliff is of African descent and had been enslaved. Other scholars theorize that he is an Irish immigrant who arrived in Liverpool to escape the Great Famine (1845–49).