Elizabethan society in an age of exploration

Question 1

What were classes like in Elizabethan England?

Answer 1

• William Harrison (english churchman) travelled around country to find out how people lived
• wrote book ‘The Descriptions of England’ described how people lived, divided society into 4
• 1. Gentlemen: Nobles, Lords, Gentry
• 2. Citizens and burgesses in town: Merchants, master craftsmen, lawyers
• 3. Yeomen: Farmers who owned land
• 4. Fourth sort: farm labourers, servants, shopkeepers, craftspeople such as shoemakers, tailors, bricklayers

Question 2

What was Elizabethan lesiure like?

Answer 2

• Archery, fishing, hunting, theatre popular amongst all classes - however wealthier had better seats and hunted deer rather than rabbit
• forth sort often drink together in inns and taverns, read stories and enjoyed gambling on bear-baiting , cock-fighting and racing
• gentlemen enjoyed fencing, tennis, bowls
• fourth sort enjoyed wrestling, running, football
• gentlemen enjoyed tobacco

Question 3

Why was education seen as important?

Answer 3

• seen as important in preparing people to live the lives their social class expect
  – emergence of humanists who believed learning generally was important and education would help reduce superstitions
• Protestants believed being able to read bible in own language formed better relationship with god
• quality dependant on class
• increasingly believed women should have an education

Question 4

What was education like in elizabethan england?

Answer 4

• Nobility - at home, lots of subjects e.g french and latin, history, politics, subjects elizabeth liked important. Taught skills such as horse riding and needlework (boys sport) girls and boys seperate from age 7
• Middle classes - traditionally churches, 1560’s 72 grammar schools opened, required fees, gentry and wealthy merchants children attended - not girls
• children of skilled craftsmen and yeomen usually learnt on the job as an apprentship
• Petty schools - set up in home of teacher, boys - read, write, arithmetic, bright or well off moved to grammar schools
• Dame schools - girls - local educated women, taught baking and sewing etc.
• lower class no formal investigation, learnt from parent
• 2 universities, start at 14-15, study gemoetry, music, astronomy, philosophy, logic, medicine, law or divinity

Question 5

What were the causes for increasing poverty in Elizabethan England?

Answer 5

• decline of cloth trade, people who worked in cloth trade unemployed
• poor harvests led to high prices and inflation - people couldn’t afford basic goods
• sheep farming grew and required little labour - rural depopulation, less land, crops given to sheep rather than hungry poor
• enclosures - individual fields belonging to one person, rural depopulation and unemployment
• Rack renting - landlords increased rent on farmers - couldnt afford and moved to towns
• Debasement - unsure value of money, goods being sold at higher prices
• Population increase - 35% increase and less jobs available - increased poverty
• monastries being closed - jobs lost, support such as food, shelter, supplies no longer provided

Question 6

What were attitudes towards poverty like?

Answer 6

• little sympathy towards poor particularly from Puritans - thought everyone should word hard to provide for themselves - Middle and Upper class - worried poor threatened social order, felt lower class should obey them, worried might revolt against them - Landowner - saw duty to help poor, didn’t have enough land - Poor - sympathy towards poverty, saw as unfair people being severly punished for stealing to support family - caused resentment to upper class and government - government worried resentment may cause uprising

Question 7

What were the governments actions towards vagabonds?

Answer 7

• Elizabeth’s government accepted some responsibility for looking after poor - distinguished between deserving poor and impotent - Statue of Artificies 1563 -imprisoned if refuse to pay poor rates imprisoned, officials failing to organise poor relief could be fined - Vagabonds act 1572 - vagrants whipped and ear drilled, imprisoned on 2nd arrest, death penalty 3rd, national poor rate payed for food and shelter - towns and cities given responsibility to find work for able poor
• Act for Relief of poor 1576 - Justice of peace to find work for able poor, refused work sent to house of corrections

Question 8

What were the reasons for exploration?

Answer 8

• competition with spain, looking for quick routes to new world to attack spanish and exploit economic opportunities - advances in mapmaking made navigation easier - advances in shipbuilding - faster and easier to manouver - collapse of cloth trade, england needed new trade partners
• desire to spread protestantism as spanish spread Catholicism
• succesful voyages increased English reputation and prestige

Question 9

What were the aims of Drake’s circumnavigation of the globe?

Answer 9

• attack spanish fleets in pacific where defences weaker - revenge for Spanish attack on hawkins fleet
• capture spanish gold
• weaken catholic enemy, Drake puritan
• make england more powerful
• new and improved trade routes

Question 10

What were the key features of Drake’s circumnavigation of the globe?

Answer 10

• left in 1577
• voyage of 5 ships, 2 big 3 small
• return to plymouth after 3 days due to bad weather
• Captured portuguese ship in Brazil, conflict with locals and trouble with crew - forced Drake to have close friend Thomas Doughrty executed
• marigold sank, elizabeth lost, just 1 ship left
• attacked by locals in south africa
• Drake captured Spanish ship Cacafuego containing £20 mil worth gold and jewels
• went further north than any english explorer
• asked if queen still alive when returned

Question 11

What were the aims of Raleigh’s voyages?

Answer 11

• gain colony in north america so england had a base for trade and attacking Spanish
• provide land for poor people
• gain resources and prestige

Question 12

What was Raleigh’s 1584 fact-finding exibition like?

Answer 12

• 2 small ships to investigate east coast of north america
• reported area suitable for new colony
• brought back two Native Indians, who they taught english and were able to learn their language

Question 13

What was Raleigh’s 1585 voyage like?

Answer 13

• ship hit rocks and was damaged letting in sea water that ruined food and seeds, arrived too late to plant own crops - Commander Ralph Lane began to build fort and settlement on roanoke island and Sir Richard Grenville returned to England to get supplies
• relations with Natives worsened and violent clashed as English not willing to put in labour - no longer safe for colonists to remain
• forced to abandon colony in Roake 1586 - Drakwe arrived same month with starving colonist aboard ship to return to England

Question 14

What was Raleigh’s 1587 voyage like?

Answer 14

• Raleigh took settler families rather than soldiers, aimed to head further north
• Expedition led by John White
• forced to stop at Roanoke as worried encounter hurrixanes
• hostile relations with natives, settler found dead, retaliation attack killed friendly natives from nearby settlements
• White returned to England to update Raleigh and gain supplies, promising return within year - couldnt happen due to armada
• White didn’t return till 11950 when colonists had dissapeared