Poverty

Question 1

Poverty

Answer 1

Increasing issue in Tudor England, as were associated problems like unemployment and vagabondage.

Question 2

Causes of poverty

population growth

Answer 2

Steady growth across the period, except in the 1550s (poor harvests and an influenza epidemic in Mary’s reign).

• 1525 = 2.25 million.
• 1551 = 3.01 million.
• 1601 = 4.1 million.

Question 3

Causes of poverty

rises of prices and falling of wages

Answer 3

As population rose, so did the pressure on resources, particularly food. Therefore, farmers and merchants could charge higher prices for their goods, leading to price inflation which was made worse because the govt didn’t have the ability to ensure its population could always be fed, especially with poor harvests (1519-21, 1527-29, 1549-51 and 1586-87) which reduced crop yield and led to death.

Question 4

Causes of poverty

dissolusion of monastries

Answer 4

The monasteries were a traditional source of support and alms (giving food, money or other forms of charity) for the poor.

Question 5

Result of poverty

Why is rising unemployment an issue

Answer 5

• May lead to social and political unrest.
• The Tudor monarchs were increasingly keen to work more closely with the local authorities and pass more social and economic legislation.

Question 6

Result of poverty

Vagrancy and begging

Answer 6

• Assumed jobs were available yet vagrants were too lazy to work.
• Used punishment to try to control the problem but more difficult to deal with wanderers, especially in times of political unrest.
• Explains why many laws made them return to their own parishes to seek help - known to local authorities and easily avoids the instability and spread of seditious ideas that undermine the Tudor state and the social order.

Question 7

Socioeconomic legislation before 1563

Solution to controlling vagrants and beggers - HVII

Answer 7

• 1495 Law - ordered beggars and the idle poor be put in the stocks for three days, whipped and returned to their original parish.
• Poor relief was based on voluntary contributions from wealthy parishioners.

Question 8

Solution to controlling vagrants and beggers - HVIII

Answer 8

• As poverty grew, punishment became more severe.
• 1531 P Law ordered vagrants to be whipped and the impotent poor were to be licensed by the JPs to beg.

Question 9

Solution to controlling vagrants and beggers - Edward VI

Answer 9

• Most severe laws passed in 1547, reflecting the rising socio-economic issues with the Vagrancy Act = a vagrant was defined as someone who was able-bodied and who had been without a master or employment for three days.
• Punishments - branded a ‘V’ into the person’s chest and forced to work as a slave for two years for the person who reported them - considered so harsh that local authorities found it impossible to enforce.
• Repealed in 1550 and replaced in 1552 - new law required registration of the incompetent poor, for the first time, and that Parish Priests and bishops to place more pressure on those reluctant to make contributions to alms.

Question 10

Solution to poverty: regulating wages and prices

Answer 10

Attempted to solve the issue through parliamentary statute:

• 1547/1555 Acts regulated cloth-making in East Anglia and Worchester.

Increasingly regulated aspects of the economy:

• 1536 = ordered local officials to find work for beggars and organise collections for the impotent poor - so radical that it wasn’t renewed but paved the way for further attempts.
• Due to alarming food price rises in the 1540s and 1550s = encouraged food production, banned price and wage fixing in 1548-49 and forbade the export of corn if prices were above a certain level in 1554.

Question 11

Why was the Statute of Artificers (1562) introduced

Answer 11

• Liz inherited a country in a socioeconomic crisis with a decreasing, malnourished population (3.01M to 2.98M 1554-6), caused by poor harvests (1554-6) and disease (influenza epidemic 1554-6). Generally the crisis was seen in 2 ways:

1) Lack of valuable food led to higher prices = poor produced just enough food from their lands to survive, or entirely reliant on buying goods. The combo of poor harvests and prices plunged people into poverty

2) Population decline pushed up wages = those who survived and had the skills to offer were able to ask and get for higher wages from employers.

• Placed pressure on the central govt and authorities in the 1550s as vagrancy causes social disorder which made those those at the top of the hierarchy nervous, introducing the Act (holistic attempt to address all issues of Tudor society).

Question 12

Main terms of the Statute of the Artificers

Answer 12

• All unmarried people under the age of 30 - compelled to work and accept any job offer.
• People aged 12-60 required to work on the land, unless gentry, heir to lands worth £10 a year, or goods worth £40, employed, skilled in a craft or attending education.
• Local JPs assessed and set wages annually.
• Fixed hours of work: Summer = 5am-7/8pm with 2 ½ hour meal breaks while the Winter was dawn to sunset.
• Apprenticeships for seven years - compulsory for any skilled occupation.

Question 13

The Statute of Artificers were significant because…

Answer 13

• Lasted for the Tudor period, replacing all previous piecemeal attempts at socio-economic legislation.
• Increased the importance of the JPs’s role in the regulation of the social and economic affairs of their region.
• Enhanced the importance of apprenticeships and protected the status of skilled craftsmen = unable to enter progression without the training.
• Emphasised the social hierarchy and food production as an essential job, involving every lower class individual.
• Implies a growing partnership between localities and centre = considered a local trend.

Question 14

The Statute of Artificers were not significant because it was backward-looking in its aims

Answer 14

• Govt tried to control wage increases and the social structure since the 14th century, responding to local experimentation with wage assessments and control - began in the 1550s.
• EXAMPLE = Corporations of London and York tried to stop builders’ wages rising out of control in 1551-52.
• EXAMPLE = Socio-economic crisis encouraged more authorities to try cap wages, especially in 1560-62.

Question 15

The Statute of Artificers were not significant because it didn’t solve all the issues

Answer 15

Further acts were required to pass to deal with the problems caused by the socioeconomic crisis - e.g the 1572 and 1576 Poor Laws and the Poor Law of 1598.

Question 16

Issues with enforcing the Statute of Artificers

Answer 16

• JP’s determination to hold down wages meant wages didn’t change for years at a time, regardless of the socio-economic issues - exacerbating poverty levels among landless peasants in e.g Kent.
• Renewed socio-economic hardship of the 1590s forced a wage increase.

Question 17

Issues of the Statute of Artificers - didn’t prevent unemployment and vagrancy

Answer 17

• Assumed there was always work for those who wanted it - resulted in migration because of seasonal change, seeking work during harvest-time, or poor harvests and disease.
• Vagrancy increased in the late 1580s and 1590s - most affected group was the cloth workers because of the disruption to European cloth exports caused by the war with Spain in 1585.

Question 18

Act for the Relief of the Poor 1563/72

Answer 18

• Culmination of previous Tudor legislation to deal with vagrancy and poverty as, under Liz, attitudes towards poverty and provision began to change.
• 1563 = almost made payments compulsory but the contributors could choose payment size. Special collectors of alms appt to collect but refusal could lead to imprisonment.
• 1572 = punishment for unlicensed beggers remained severe, increasing the difficulty to obtain a licence (signed by 2 JPs). Tackled unemployment by making towns and cities responsible for finding work for the idle poor and encouraged parishes with extra poor relief funds to build ‘houses of corrections’ for vagrants and beggars.

Question 19

How was the 1570s and 1580s a period of relative economic stability?

Answer 19

• No further legislation passed until the 1590s.
• Few poor harvests.
• Increased expectation, enforced by parliamentary law, that parishes and contributors would provide aid for the poor.
• EXAMPLE = large towns like Norwich and York set up contributions in 1549 and 1550.
• EXAMPLE = York ran a hospital for the poor previously owned by the Catholic Church.

Question 20

How were the Acts ineffective against the socio-economic crisis in 1594-98?

Answer 20

• Cold weather caused famine in some regions of the North, wages fell and plague broke out.

Such issues caused unrest:

• Food riots in London, the South East and the South West in 1596 - feared by the Privy Council riots would turn into camping rebellions, like 1549.
• Although, the attempted uprising in Oxfordshire against the Lord Lieutenant was overturned due to small size = still impactful as it made the Council nervous, interrogating rebels in person and passed 1598 Poor Law.

Question 21

Act for the Relief of the Poor 1598

Answer 21

• Came from private bills
• Introduced the post of the overseer of the poor for each parish = assessed how much poor relief was needed, and to collect and distribute the relief.
• Supervised by JPs = given additional powers to raise compulsory contributions, and punish those who refused.

Question 22

What other acts was the AOTFROTP 1598 combined with to strengthen govt response?

Answer 22

• Vagabondage Act 1598 = most dangerous vagrants banished or sent to the Queen’s galleys.
• Act for the Relief of Soldiers and Mariners 1593 = provided pensions for wounded former soldiers - a real necessity in a country that had been in war since 1585.

Question 23

What was the result of the 1598 Poor Law?

Answer 23

• For the first time - contributions fully compulsory.
• Not an innovation - result of the panic by those with land and property due to the socio-economic crisis of the 1590s and built on 50 years of experimentation - most tried before in private and local initiatives, adopted by the national government.
• Slightly revised by a second Act in 1601 - seemingly effective.