Elizabeth Society + Economy:

Pre-existing social factors:

- Bad harvests + rain → food was scarce + expensive
- Influenza epidemic → highest mortality rate since Black Death + population decline
- Disastrous war with France: lost Calais due to Spanish marriage

Society + Economy:
- 1550s: 3M vs 1603: 4M population → London 130-150K population
- 2nd largest: Norwich 15K → 90% lived in villages
- Higher fertility rate (34.5/1000) + lower death rate (25/1000)
- Higher life expectancy - 40yrs
- By 1597 acute food shortage → famine in some parts
- Decline of property owning aristocracy + rise of gentry in wealth (monopoly) + socially
→ 60% of aristocracy were in financial ruin by 1603 (over spent)
- Decline in “mere” gentry → small scale landowners suffered from inflation
- New land from dissolved monasteries + chantries
- Rising population → greater wealth from agriculture
- COPYHOLDERS

Causes of Inflation: multicausal + inconsistent → cumulative effect

● Population rise → more demand for food than supply
○ HOWEVER: population pressure affected all of Western Europe
● Poor harvests in 1550s + 1594
○ Short term impact on inflation → 1594: higher corn prices
● Debasement of coinage
○ Fund H8 French wars (£3.6M for 1540s) + Somerset’s garrisoning → secretly
debased in 1542-44 + publicly in 1544-45 to fund £1.6M gap
○ Elizabeth later reminted coin + controlled money supply
○ Restored confidence in economy +
● Increased govt spending - wars + Spanish Armada
● Land speculation after dissolution of monasteries
○ Mainly affected nobility, not commoners
○ Decline of sheep + wool trade - Antwerp cloth market + disruption
of trade in 1580s-1600s
● Land use for enclosures
● Bullions (silver) - more money into economy + higher prices
○ Spanish silver ships from Peru + Bolivia (Potosi Pero in New World
○ HOWEVER: long process of smelting + transport → time lag
○ Begins causing inflation in Spain in 1550s + hits England in 1560s
■ Affects wealthy merchants
→ fear of social instability from poverty + vagrancy
- High mortality rate: reduced labour supply
 - central govt mechanisms: Royal Proclamations + instruct JPs (inefficient)
→ issuing Royal Proclamations= sign of govt incompetence
→ lacked powers of enforcement + inefficient JPs
- Local Initiatives:
→ Council of North tried to enforce schedule of wage rates in Hull + York
- Charged 113 labourers for unlawfully high wages
→ counties tried to establish appropriate wage rates for trade- minimise inflation
(Buckinghamshire + Worcestershire + Northamptonshire)
- Statute of Artificers 1563
- compulsory labour at harvest time
- JPs set maximum wage rates in each county
-mandatory 7 year apprenticeship for a craftsman

Poor Relief:

DEC 1560: ordered all debased money to be returned + replaced with greater silver content →
returned quality to pre-debasement 1542-44 + finished in 1561
- Limited money supply + re-established public confidence
- 1568 Genoese loans - Elizabeth acquired silver
1563 Statute of Artificers: govt attempted to limit demand by controlling wages
- Wage limits for skilled workers
- HOWEVER: reappearance of inflation in 1590s after Spanish war = fall in
living standard of skilled workers + higher cost of living

Response to Poverty + Vagrancy:

- Norwich + Ipswich + Cambridge introduced laws for poor
-

Causes of Poverty:
- Population rise 43% between 1550 and 1600 → pressure on scarce food
- 1590s: harvest failure caused famine/ near famine (dearth) conditions
-
-

Poverty + Poor Relief:

- 1572 Act: local ratepayers required to pay for poor relief
- 1576 Poor Law Act: 1st attempt to create national system of poor relief to be financed +
administered locally → towns required to make provisions for employing deserving poor
- 1597 + 1601 Acts:
- 1601 Poor Law Act: parish became designated as institution needed to
raise rates for + administer poor relief
- → appoint poor overseer: ensure poor rates collected + distribute relief
+ relief impotent poor + apprentice poor children (supervised by JP)
- Ensured minimum level of subsistence for deserving poor
- Harsh treatment for undeserving poor → 1547 Act notion: whip undeserving poor
- 1597: whip first time offenders, repeat offenders can be executed
REGIONAL ISSUES:
→ only 1 serious Rebellion: Northern Rebellion 1569
Wales:
- Border administration structures intact (Council of Wales + Marches) -
rare border issues
- Welsh language disappeared in govt (exc. Translated Bible + Prayer
Book)
- Disproportionate no. of Welshmen in Essex Rebellion → discontent

Scotland:
-

Ireland:
- 1560: Elizabeth proclaimed Supreme Governor of Church of Ireland
- Lacked power to enforce Protestantism on Catholic, Gaelic population
- Rebellions: 1569-73 + 1579-82 (Lord Deputy Lord Grey of Wilton’s brutality)
- 1595: Hugh O’Neill Ulster clan chief (also Earl of Tyrone) Rebellion
- 1596 Spanish contingent exacerbated unrest (unsuccessful)
- 1598 Aug: Battle of Yellow Ford → Tyrone control Ireland “beyond the Pale”
→ threat of independent Catholic Ireland + Spanish alliance
- 1599: Essex sent as Lord Lieutenant → disobeyed + made truce instead of confronting
Tyrone
- Truce expired + Tyrone camped south + hoped to join forces with Spain
- Martial law
-

Final Years of Elizabeth’s reign:

- 1594-7: 4 successive + serious crop failures → higher agricultural prices
- 1590s: approx. ⅓ increase in prices
- Plague outbreaks → exacerbated by food shortages
- 1000s deaths in 1592-3 (1st outbreak) + decimated pop. over 10yrs
- 1598 + 1601 Poor Laws → highlighted Privy Council’s fear of social unrest
- Lack of significant popular rebellions → only small local food riots in London, South East
+ West in 1595 + 1596-7 East Anglia
- Only when rumours that merchants hoarded food → higher prices