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Tudor Response to the Travelling Poor

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Abstract

This chapter examines the condition of the travelling poor during the sixteenth century. After the turmoil of the Hundred Years War and factional friction with the Wars of the Roses, the accession of Henry VII in 1485 initiated the Tudor dynasty. It was an era of relative stability vital for economic advance of the fortunate but throughout the Kingdom poverty remained rife. The world seemed smaller with England constantly gathering new territorial acquisitions. These were to benefit trade greatly in the centuries that followed. The attitudes to religion brought by the Reformation favoured economic development but of most immediate significance was the increase in population from around 1500 after more than a century of decline and stagnation.

The tragedy of the tramp is his isolation. Every man’s hand is against him: and his history is inevitably written by his enemies.l

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Notes

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economic History, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK

    Robert Humphreys

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  1. Robert Humphreys
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© 1999 Robert Humphreys

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Humphreys, R. (1999). Tudor Response to the Travelling Poor. In: No Fixed Abode. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230510869_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230510869_3

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-349-40905-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-0-230-51086-9

  • eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)

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