power. 18 Part I: Encountering the Early Tudors
The average village was made up of:
Yeomen: They rented their farms from landowners, served the com-
munity as church administrators or constables (sort of policemen, but
don't expect too many arrests!), paid taxes and often sent their sons to
school or even university.
Craftsmen: Blacksmiths, carpenters, thatchers, innkeepers and many
more provided specialist services for the village.
A parson: The local priest ran services, baptised newborns, married
betrothed couples and buried the dead.
Landless labourers: They worked for yeomen farmers and were
likely to lose their jobs if land was enclosed (see the nearby sidebar
`Encountering enclosure').
It's important to bear in mind at all times the central place of religion in
ordinary people's lives. Fitzherbert says the first thing people should do
when they get up in the morning is say their prayers (in Latin) and ask God to
`speed the plough'. Later editions drop the Latin bit in favour of the English
Lord's prayer.
The daily work was different from summer to winter, the days longer or
shorter, and therefore wages differed accordingly. But no welfare state existed
in the 16th century. Poor people relied on handouts from the local community,
but the sturdy beggars (men who were perfectly fit to work) were an ongoing
problem for Tudor law and order.
While their men folk toiled, women also had plenty to do. In the Book of
Husbandry it says that a husbandman's wife must:
Clean the house
Feed the calves
Feed the pigs
Go to market if her husband isn't available
Help her husband fill or empty the muck cart
Know how to make hay, winnow corn and malt
Look after the poultry and collect their eggs
Make clothes from wool by spinning and weaving
Make butter and cheese
Prepare all her husband's meals
Prepare the milk
Supervise the servants (if she has any)
Wake and dress the children Chapter 1: Touring the Time of the Tudors 19
Encountering enclosure The huge death rate caused by the Black profitable than growing crops). The various Death (bubonic plague), which reached 50 per local rebellions by ordinary people, such as cent in some areas, led to countryside chaos Kett's and the Oxfordshire rising (see Chapters in the 1350s. Some landowners hit upon the 7 and 8), were often about this enclosure idea of enclosing land � putting hedges or because farm labourers lost money and jobs as walls around fields � and turning the common a result. When the population began to pick up land that everyone could use into sheep farms again in the 1470s people demanded a return to for their own benefit (sheep rearing was more crop farming to grow more food.
Sound familiar? Maybe, but these women had no birth control, no vote, only
the most basic rights and no underwear worthy of the name. Women's lib
was 450 years away.
Chartering towns
The older and larger towns had charters given to them by previous kings.
Smaller ones had charters from local lords. These charters allowed towns
to hold fairs � like the Goose Fair in Nottingham or the Midsummer Fair in
Cambridge � which were opportunities to buy, sell and have a good time.
The merchant guilds in these towns (today's chambers of commerce) were
companies of skilled craftsmen, keeping out rival competition and acting as
friendly societies, paying for their members' burials and looking after widows
and orphans.
Councils under the mayor and aldermen ran the towns and you had to be a
householder or a rich merchant to be elected. Chartered towns sent two rep-
resentatives as MPs to the House of Commons in London.
Paying the price
Inflation was running at 9 per cent in Edward VI's reign and got worse again
towards the end of Elizabeth's. Wages always fell short of costs and that was
the cause of much discontent in the countryside. It didn't help that various
Tudor governments did their best to
The average village was made up of:
Yeomen: They rented their farms from landowners, served the com-
munity as church administrators or constables (sort of policemen, but
don't expect too many arrests!), paid taxes and often sent their sons to
school or even university.
Craftsmen: Blacksmiths, carpenters, thatchers, innkeepers and many
more provided specialist services for the village.
A parson: The local priest ran services, baptised newborns, married
betrothed couples and buried the dead.
Landless labourers: They worked for yeomen farmers and were
likely to lose their jobs if land was enclosed (see the nearby sidebar
`Encountering enclosure').
It's important to bear in mind at all times the central place of religion in
ordinary people's lives. Fitzherbert says the first thing people should do
when they get up in the morning is say their prayers (in Latin) and ask God to
`speed the plough'. Later editions drop the Latin bit in favour of the English
Lord's prayer.
The daily work was different from summer to winter, the days longer or
shorter, and therefore wages differed accordingly. But no welfare state existed
in the 16th century. Poor people relied on handouts from the local community,
but the sturdy beggars (men who were perfectly fit to work) were an ongoing
problem for Tudor law and order.
While their men folk toiled, women also had plenty to do. In the Book of
Husbandry it says that a husbandman's wife must:
Clean the house
Feed the calves
Feed the pigs
Go to market if her husband isn't available
Help her husband fill or empty the muck cart
Know how to make hay, winnow corn and malt
Look after the poultry and collect their eggs
Make clothes from wool by spinning and weaving
Make butter and cheese
Prepare all her husband's meals
Prepare the milk
Supervise the servants (if she has any)
Wake and dress the children Chapter 1: Touring the Time of the Tudors 19
Encountering enclosure The huge death rate caused by the Black profitable than growing crops). The various Death (bubonic plague), which reached 50 per local rebellions by ordinary people, such as cent in some areas, led to countryside chaos Kett's and the Oxfordshire rising (see Chapters in the 1350s. Some landowners hit upon the 7 and 8), were often about this enclosure idea of enclosing land � putting hedges or because farm labourers lost money and jobs as walls around fields � and turning the common a result. When the population began to pick up land that everyone could use into sheep farms again in the 1470s people demanded a return to for their own benefit (sheep rearing was more crop farming to grow more food.
Sound familiar? Maybe, but these women had no birth control, no vote, only
the most basic rights and no underwear worthy of the name. Women's lib
was 450 years away.
Chartering towns
The older and larger towns had charters given to them by previous kings.
Smaller ones had charters from local lords. These charters allowed towns
to hold fairs � like the Goose Fair in Nottingham or the Midsummer Fair in
Cambridge � which were opportunities to buy, sell and have a good time.
The merchant guilds in these towns (today's chambers of commerce) were
companies of skilled craftsmen, keeping out rival competition and acting as
friendly societies, paying for their members' burials and looking after widows
and orphans.
Councils under the mayor and aldermen ran the towns and you had to be a
householder or a rich merchant to be elected. Chartered towns sent two rep-
resentatives as MPs to the House of Commons in London.
Paying the price
Inflation was running at 9 per cent in Edward VI's reign and got worse again
towards the end of Elizabeth's. Wages always fell short of costs and that was
the cause of much discontent in the countryside. It didn't help that various
Tudor governments did their best to
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