The Poor

Question 1

The fourth sort

Answer 1

Labouring poor
Half of all the fams
Illiterate, did not own land, spent 80% of income on food and drink
North west poorest

Question 2

Population growth

Answer 2

• 43% between 1550 and 1600
• huge pressure on resources (food and jobs)
• wages stayed the same but food prices driven up - inflation

Question 3

Exploration of the New world

Answer 3

• central and South America
• more silver in circulation throughout Europe
• reduced values of currencies and pushed prices up

Question 4

Henry VIII coinage

Answer 4

• decreases in value in the 1540s to pay for his ears against France and Scotland

Question 5

War

Answer 5

• Taxes hit poor hardest
• Large numbers of unemployed soldiers and sailors
• Harmful effect on trade - collapse of Antwerp woollen cloth in 1550s and band on trade with Spanish ruled Netherlands in 1560s-1580s meant exports down

Question 6

Trade monopolies

Answer 6

• encouraged by liz

* made the rich richer by pushing up prices - made the poor poorer

Question 7

Agricultural crises

Answer 7

• disastrous harvests caused by dearth conditions before Liz
• more in 1590s with plague
• threat of famine pushed up prices
• rack-renting led to spiralling rents and lots of egditons
• growth of enclosure - open fields combined and enclosed with hedges to allow former stable land to be turned over to more profitable sheep farming - farm labourers lost jobs
• enclosure meant landless poor meant their animals had nowhere to graze- vital means of feeding fam had been taken away

Question 8

Worst harvests were in

Answer 8

• 1562
• 1565
• 1573
• 1586
• 1594-97

Question 9

Dissolution of monasteries

Answer 9

• key source of charity- providing good, shelter and medical care
• so poor people flocked to towns, venting poverty to public attention, causing the authorities to respond

Question 10

Impotent poor

Answer 10

Could not provide for themselves because they were too young, old or ill

Not to blame and government was sympathetic

Question 11

Idle poor

Answer 11

• Major threat to social order
• Dishonest vagabonds (moves in groups) ‘sturdy beggars’
• Immoral criminals
• Vagrants and beggars hated - attacked on streets
• 1567- Thomas Harman writes book with advice on tricks played by different types of beggars
• disgusted Puritan officials

Question 12

canting

Answer 12

Coded language of idle beggars

Question 13

Anglers

Answer 13

Long stick

Used to steal clothes from people’s washing lines at night

Question 14

Ruffler

Answer 14

Look like an army officer

Robbed people at sword point

Question 15

Clapperdudgeons

Answer 15

Used arsenic to make their skin bleed so pretending to be badly injured - wrapping their arms and legs in bloody rags

Question 16

Doxy

Answer 16

Always wearing a needle in her hat

Large pack ferried in her back which held all her stolen gods

Question 17

Counterfeit cranks

Answer 17

Dressed in old dirty clothes

Pretended to have epileptic fits, using soap to make themselves foam st the mouth

Question 18

Abraham men

Answer 18

Pretend to be mad

Walked around half naked making strange wailing Jose’s

Question 19

Major outbreaks of plague in..

Answer 19

• 1563
• 1583
• 1586
• 1590
• 1593

Question 20

Recoinage

Answer 20

Early in reign
Planned by Mary
Slowing down rate of inflation caused by Henry’s debasement of coinage

Question 21

Statue of Artificers

Answer 21

• 1563

* places wage limits on skilled workers in an attempt to slow down rate of inflation

Question 22

Act of Husbandry and Tillage

Answer 22

• 1598

* attempt to slow down trend for enclosure to protect rural jobs

Question 23

Alms

Answer 23

Collected for the poor on a local level (in Norwich)

Question 24

Censuses

Answer 24

Carried out to make registers of the poor

Local

Question 25

Workhouses

Answer 25

Set up to provide work for the poor

Local

Question 26

Hospitals

Answer 26

• St. Bartholomew’s for the sick
• St. Thomas’ for the elderly
• Christ’s Hospital for orphans
• Bethlehem Hospital (Bedlam) for the insane

Local

Question 27

Legislation regarding the poor passed in

Answer 27

• 1563
• 1572
• 1576
• 1597 - Poor Law
• 1601 - Act for the Relief of the Poor

Question 28

What was the Poor Law?

Answer 28

• everyone had to pay towards a local poor rate
• refusal to pay could results in fines or imprisonment
• local tax paid towards parish officials, setting up of workhouses, payment relief to impotent poor
• compelled each parish to appoint 4 ‘overseers of the poor’ - ensure that orphans had apprenticeships (paid for by parish)
• almshouses provides for the old and ill to live in - could receive handouts of money, food and clothing - ‘outdoor relief’

Question 29

1576 Poor Law

Answer 29

3rd type of poor: able bodied but genuinely unable to find work

Question 30

Act for the Relief of the “&&4

Answer 30

Continued to recognise category 3

Overseers had to provide tolls and stocks of raw materials (hemp, wool, wood, iron? Paid from the poor rate. These where used in a ‘House of Industry’ or work house to provide able-bodied poor with employment. Wages paid out of poor rate until they found alternative employment

Question 31

Punishments brought into legislation

Answer 31

• Begging forbidden - could be punished through whipping ‘til his back be bloody’ then sent home to place of birth
• Or could be imprisoned and put to work in a ‘House of Correction’
• Some sent to work on galley warships
• Persistent beggars (outlined by earlier legislation) would be hanged