Economic Developments

Question 1

Trade?

Answer 1

• grew considerable during eliz’s reign
• foreign trade was surpassed in value by internal trade
• although exports of coal to France increased, there was an even greater growth in the shipping of coal from the River Tyne to the River Thames to supply the London market

Question 2

What did external trade involve?

Answer 2

• a flourishing cloth trade w the Netherlands - however, in the 1980s, the main markets for wool moved from the southern to northern Netherlands, as Cecil encouraged trade w prot Amsterdam rather than w Antwerp which was under catholic Spanish control - decline of Antwerp
• a broadening of overseas markets - there was an incr in trade w the Ottoman Empire - trade links established w India and trading routes extending into Russia. A wider range of luxury goods was imported in return.
  3 expeditions by john Hawkins - he acquired slaves to transport to South America in exchange for other goods, and was backed by London merchants and prominent courtiers, including Leicester. Elizabeth gave support (selling ships), but the 3rd expedition suffered a Spanish blockade in Mexico in 1568 - Hawkins activities worsened relations w Spain, but even eliz saw the potential gains in riches abroad.
  The formation of a number of trading companies - had varying degrees of success in widening England’s trade interests

Question 3

What was the Muscovy Company?

Answer 3

Set up in 1555 (under Mary i)
Russia and Northern Europe
Failed in the long term to compete effectively with the Dutch

Question 4

What was the Turkish company?

Answer 4

1581
Ottoman Empire set up to trade
Reasonably successful

Question 5

Significance of the return of Francis drake from a 3 year circumnavigation of the globe?

Answer 5

Returned in 1580
Showed the potential of sail and the new opportunity to acquire new trading lands

Question 6

What happened in 1584?

Answer 6

The expedition of Roanoke Island
Foundation of colony named Virginia (in honour of Elizabeth, the virgin queen)

Question 7

Results of the expedition to Roanoke island?

Answer 7

Further expeditions (1585 and 1587) all failed to establish a permanent settlement
Problems of a native hostility and insufficient support from England, which was embroiled in war w Spain

Question 8

How was there prosperity?

Answer 8

• agricultural production increased overall (but bad harvests interrupted)
• cloth making in rural areas increased - but some old-established cloth towns such as Winchester died
• new urban settlements developed - thriving on a broad range of manufacture (e.g. Manchester and Plymouth)
• London grew and provided a market for internal goods (e.g. coal from Newcastle)
• shipbuilding and its associate ports grew and prospered with the growth of trade
• the south-east flourished. The poorest counties were those in the north and West Midlands
• legislation to regulate trade and industry increased. This was a sign of the gov’s awareness that the taxes and duties which could be levied on manufacturers brought wealth to the country as a whole
• acts to regulate trade in cloth, leather, coal, iron, grain and timber
• two navigation acts to promote the use of English ships
• statute of artificers (1563) to fix prices, regulate wages, restrict worker’s freedom of movement and control apprenticeships (this replaced a number of functions of the old guilds).

Question 9

How was there depression?

Answer 9

Harvest failure could be disasterous - 4 successive bad harvests 1594-97 led to some serious poverty
By 1596, real wages had collapsed to less than half the level of 9 years earlier, and 1596-97 saw a subsistence crisis
Distress was widespread, but particularly bad in the far north, where people died of starvation, both in remote and rural areas and in Newcastle (to which the poor and needy from further afield gravitated).