Edexcel GCSE History - Early Elizabethan England KT3

What is a golden age?

An age of relative peace, prosperity and happiness for the many - may well see many new inventions and discoveries in this time period.

Key Arguments FOR a Golden Age

- Flourishing of education

- Growth of theatre

- Greater opportunities to enjoy leisure/pastimes

- Voyages of exploration and discovery

- Defeat of the Spanish Armada, combined with England's rising status as a military and naval power.

- Increased government help and intervention for the poor

Key Arguments AGAINST a Golden Age

- Increase in poverty and vagabondage

On a lesser scale... opposition to theatre, the fact that educational opportunities did not increase for all and the idea that many of the Elizabethan entertainments were by modern standards, cruel and barbaric.

How did Elizabethans view their own society?

According to William Harrison's 1577 book The Description of England, the population saw themselves as divided into four classes:

- Gentlemen: nobles, lords and gentry

- Citizens and burgesses in towns: merchants, master craftsmen and lawyers

- Yeomen: farmers who owned their own land

- The fourth sort: the working classes and unemployed

How did the nobility spend their leisure time?

- There was greater opportunity to pursue leisure activities amongst all social classes, but some activities were enjoyed exclusively by the nobility and upper classes:

- 'Drinking' tobacco was an expensive hobby and treat for when money was not so scarce

- Sports: tennis, fencing and bowls

- Nobles employed household musicians, while the gentry bought madrigal songbooks and organised musical evenings.

How did the fourth sort spend their leisure time?

- Inns and taverns were an important part of everyday life for the lower classes: ale was even drunk at breakfast

- Gambling on the outcomes of sports such as bear-baiting, cock fighting and racing, as well as cards and dice were popular (easy win)

- Sports: wrestling, running and football - football was particularly violent, and players sometimes died!

- Storytelling or singing of ballads (with their own lyrics often added to tunes composed in London)

Which activities were enjoyed by everyone?

- Celebrating of feast days such as Saints' Days, Plough Monday, or Elizabeth's accession day - a chance for dancing and drinking in the village

- Archery and fishing were popular at all levels of society

- All classes took part in hunting, except the nobility would more commonly hunt deer and the poor, rabbit.

What was the theatre like before Elizabeth's reign?

- No theatres had been built for 1000 years

- Plays were popular, with groups of actors travelling around the country with acrobats, jugglers and minstrels... the plays performed however were usually from the Bible (miracle plays)

Why and how did theatre grow?

- Whilst many people saw theatre as a threat to law and order and said that actors should be punished as vagabonds, powerful nobles such as the Earl of Leicester, increasingly started to give financial and legal support to troupes of actors.

- Wealthy traders had both the time and money to watch plays and against this backdrop, the first theatre opened since Roman times opened just outside London in 1576

- It was called The Theatre and was built by James Burbage - others such as The Rose opened in 1587.

Who enjoyed the theatre?

- All social classes enjoyed the theatre.

- Entrance fees were cheap; for one penny the audience could stand in the pit. These 'groundlings' would be extremely close to the actors and had a reputation for being smelly (also known as penny stinkards) and noisy!

- For two or three pennies, wealthier spectators could stand or sit in covered galleries and the upper classes often sat in the 'Lord's Room's which were raised seats behind the stage.

Opposition to the theatre?

- Some Elizabethans opposed the theatre because they thought it would encourage idleness, spread disease and create unrest

Puritans believed that theatres were the work of the Devil and the Lord Mayor of London asked the Privy Council to control the theatres, although the Privy Council only shut them down in times of plague.

- The Queen herself enjoyed theatre, but was worried that audiences might hear political or religious messages which criticized her government - from 1572, censorship was introduced and all acting companies had to possess a royal licence.

Did educational opportunities improve? Literacy

- Although most people were still too poor to go to school, by the end of Elizabeth's reign the percentage of men who could read had jumped from 10%-25%.

- For women the number rose from 1-10%

- Majority of gentry and yeomen were literate

- Underpinned by the printing press and availability of mass produced books for the first time

Did educational opportunities improve? Grammar schools

- Elizabeth's reign saw a flourishing of new grammar schools (72 opened)

- These were for sons of gentry, merchants and yeomen and demand from all social classes increased during her reign

- Subjects taught were mainly Latin and Greek, as was classics to include spiritual and personal growth

- Encouraged social mobility among these classes

Did educational opportunities improve? Public schools

- Earliest independent schools (Winchester and Eton) were set up

- These were fee paying boarding schools set up for ruling class boys.

- All lessons were taught in Latin and the curriculum combined methods of the grammar schools with an emphasis on conduct, courtesy and etiquette necessary to produce gentlemen destined for court

Did educational opportunities improve? Universities

Approx one in three graduates of Oxford and Cambridge came from the nobility, but the rest came from lower social classes

- Example of Christopher Marlowe (famous playwright) who won a scholarship from his local school to go to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge

- University education was increasingly necessary for a career at court

Did educational opportunities improve? Against

- Most people still too poor to send their children to school

- Upper and middling classes benefitted, whilst the poor did not

- Lower class schooling did not change at all: the only hope you had of being educated if lower class was being taught to read by your master at your place of work

- Additionally only boys usually got a formal education. Girls remained at home.

Why did poverty increase? Harvests and changes to farming

- Everyone depended on food grown by farmers, but farmer were at the mercy of the weather.

- During Elizabeth's reign, there were two really bad sequences of harvests, in the early 1570s and the mid-1590s.

- One bad harvest caused food prices to rise and shortages. Three + years meant thousands of deaths

- Many farmers began to look for more profitable ways to earn their living, by switching to different methods of agriculture.

- One method was to enclose land with hedges and put sheep on it instead of growing crop. This saved the farmers money because they did not have to employ labourers to work the land. The village labourers who worked on this land lost their jobs and hones, and many moved to towns hoping to find work. Some landlords also increased the rent on the lands they rented out to farmers. This was called rack-renting. Many farmers could not afford to pay these higher rents, so they too moved to towns in search of work.

Why did poverty increase? Unemployment in industries

- The only important industry in the sixteenth century was the cloth trade, where English woollen cloth was exported to Europe. This had provided work for many spinners and weavers. When the cloth trade collapsed in the 1550s (see top right graph), thousands of people lost their jobs.

Why did poverty increase? Population increase

- The country's population had fallen by nearly half at the time of the Black Death in 1348-9. It remained low until the sixteenth century, when it began to increase.

- The rise in population became steeper in Elizabeth's reign. This rise in population meant that more jobs were needed, but as you have read, there were fewer jobs in farming and the cloth industry. More and more people could not find work, so could not earn money.

Why did poverty increase? Inflation

- Another problem creating poverty was inflation - prices were going up all across Europe.

- However prices, especially the price of food, rose much more steeply, especially after 1570. The result was that people, especially those on lower wages, struggled to afford even basic food. Prices might be going up, but their wages were not. This was caused by increased population/demand, but inability to meet this.

- Henry VIII's debasement of the coinage in the 1540s, when he ordered all the coins to be melted down, also played a part.

- These coins had contained precious metals like gold or silver, but when the new coins were minted, they contained far less gold and silver. After this, people no longer trusted its value, so merchants and shopkeepers began to put up prices, so they felt they were getting the same value for what they sold.

Why did poverty increase? The closure of the monasteries

- Until the 1530s, the monasteries provided food and shelter for the homeless and unemployed.

- However, they were closed down by Henry VIII in the late 1530s. This Dissolution of the Monasteries meant that there was less help for the poor, and many of them were left to wander the roads or drift to the towns in search of work.

Why were Elizabethans so worried about poverty?

- Very religious society: laziness/idleness was a sin against God

- Exaggerated writings e.g. by Thomas Harman made people believe there were more vagabonds than there were and stirred up panic

- Landowners had a duty of care, and took this seriously, but struggled to meet this with increased numbers of beggars.

- Danger of rebellion

- Beggars often turned to crime and JPS believed they were a serious threat to their authority

- People thought vagabonds carried diseases e.g. plague

- Threatened social hierarchy and the idea everybody had a fixed place.

What were vagabonds?

Vagabonds were wandering beggars who were fit and strong, but deliberately avoiding work.

- Elizabethan government accepted some responsibility for looking after the poor and distinguished between the 'deserving poor' (those who wanted to work, but could not and the 'idle poor' who were able bodied, but did not work.

New laws - The Vagabonds Act 1572

- Anyone found guilty of being a vagabond, over the age of 14, was to be whipped and burned through the right ear.

- 2nd offence, vagabonds were sent to prison

- Persistent offenders were executed

- Children of convicted beggars were placed in domestic service

- Local JPs were ordered to keep a register of the poor in their parish, and to raise a poor rate to pay for food and shelter for the sick and elderly.

New laws - Act for Relief of the Poor, 1576

- Towns were required to find work for the able-bodied poor

- Those refusing an offer of work were to be sent to a house of correction (prison)

Did Elizabeth's gov. try hard to help everyone who was poor? YES

Rich and powerful people (maybe members of gov) had a duty to help local people who had fallen on hard times and took this duty seriously - poor relief (gifts of money and food to the poor),

JPs worked hard to prevent problems of law and order/do a good job at enforcing their authority in localities/ shift in the amount of government involvement over the reign:

the first act was 1572 Vagabond Act which made several positive changes e.g. forcing JPs to keep a register of the poor in their parish and raising a poor rate to pay for their food and shelter + children of convicted beggars were placed in domestic service

Act of Relief for the Poor 1576 made in a requirement for towns to find work for the able bodied poor

Did Elizabeth's gov. try hard to help everyone? NO

- Acts only came in later, the gov's main role was protecting the country and raising tax.

- Some MPs felt strongly that idleness displeased God and instead punished vagabonds, rather than helping them

- Acts did not explicitly help the poor always: e.g. vagabonds were sent to prison and whipped and burned through the right ear

Overall did Elizabeth's government try hard to help?

Elizabeth's government are surprisingly proactive for the age, but it seems likely they were responding to sense of crisis: it's not as if role of government actually shifts - however, you can find examples of them helping poor and Vagabond Act/Act for Poor Relief (particularly) are major turning points in English social history - especially as they last 200 years.

Why was there so much overseas exploration? Conflict with Spain

The growing wealth and power of Catholic Spain was based on the gold and silver mines of Spanish territories in the New World, mainly Mexico and Peru. The English desire to attack and plunder these territories increased as relations with Spain grew worse in the 1580s and the English fears of a Catholic invasion grew. English explorers (pirates in the eyes of the Spanish) such as John Hawkins and Francis Drake, took no notice of trade restrictions on Spanish territories, especially once it was clear that Spain was no longer England's ally.

Why was there so much overseas exploration? Desire to spread Protestantism

Converting heathen lands to Christianity had long been the motive behind many of the earlier Spanish expeditions. Individual popes had blessed those Jesuit priests who undertook terrifying journeys as missionaries in far-off lands. Elizabethan explorers were no different, although their aim was to spread Protestantism, and in their case, this was to be largely achieved by holding back the continuing expansion of their Catholic enemies.

Why was there so much overseas exploration? New ship/sailing technology

By the middle of the sixteenth century, developments in the design of ships, and the navigational instruments they carried meant that sailors could make longer voyages than ever before. In 1569, the Flemish mapmaker, Gerardus Mercator, introduced sea charts showing the parallels of latitude and longitude. Elizabethan sailors could now use an astrolabe to determine their latitude by measuring the angle between the horizon and the North Star. By the Elizabethan period, astrolabes had become very sophisticated and consisted of a large brass ring fitted with a sighting rule.

Why so much overseas exploration? Expansion of trade

Before the 1550s nearly all English trade was concentrated on exporting woollen cloth to Europe; this had accounted for 75 per cent of all exports and brought in annual customs duties of between £35,000 and £50,000. Once this trade collapsed, English merchants needed to find new markets to sell their goods. This motivated journeys overland, as well as overseas, with some Elizabethan explorers establishing trade agreements with countries as far away as Russia and India. The most lucrative form of trade, however, was the illegal trade of selling items, including slaves, to the Spanish colonists in the New World.

Why did Drake circumnavigate the globe, 1577-80?

- Profit - main purpose was to raid the Spanish colonies in the Pacific.

- Revenge - Drake wanted revenge for Spanish attack on his ships at St Juan de Ulua in 1568 - had resulted in the devastation of the English fleet, with 325 men killed and Drake returning home with only 15 men.

- Drake did not intend to circumnavigate the globe - prime objective was to plunder the Spaniards.

What was the significance of Drake's voyage? Boosted England's reputation

- Drake's voyage almost ended in disaster. He set out with five ships and, by the time he reached the pacific in 1578, he only had one left: The Golden Hind.

- Despite this, he and his 56 surviving men managed to return to England in 1580 after circumnavigating the globe. They were only the second crew in History to have achieved such a feat.

- Great boost to English morale and established the reputation of English ships and sailors as being among the finest in the world.

What was the significance of Drake's voyage? Encouraged exploration

- Drake and his crew survived in part by raiding Spanish ships and colonies up the coast of South America.

- Believed that they made it as far north as Vancouver.

- They gathered a great deal of useful information about the Americas, as well as keeping thorough logs of their voyage that could be written up and shared with other English sailors.

What was the significance of Drake's voyage? Nova Albion

- In June 1579, the Golden Hind was in urgent need of repair after having explored the furthest reaches of North America's pacific coast.

- Drake landed in a bay that was probably north of modern-day San Francisco. The local Native Americans treated the English with great hospitality. They performed a ceremony that Drake took to be the equivalent of a coronation. He named the region Nova Albion and declared Elizabeth I to be its sovereign.

- Elizabeth I and other European rulers did not recognise the agreement made by the pope almost a century earlier that gave the Americas to the Spanish and Portuguese.

- Elizabeth herself gave her explorers the right to take any land that no other Christian leader had claimed. The peaceful welcome given to Drake in what was later called California encouraged the idea that Europeans could settle, and even rule, there.

What was the significance of Drake's circumnavigation? Encouraging colonies

- In 1578, while Drake was undertaking his circumnavigation, Elizabeth I gave Sir Humphrey Gilbert permission to set out on a voyage of discovery to North America. It ended in disaster. Gilbert was bankrupted.

- In 1583, he was prepared to set out again. Since Gilbert's earlier failure, Drake had returned to England with wealth and reports that encouraged adventurers and investors to continue trying to establish their own colonies there.

Who was Walter Raleigh?

- A nobleman and courtier from the West Country who became a well known explorer during Elizabeth's reign - never a privy councillor, but one of Elizabeth's favourites who she lavished with gifts e.g. London home

- In 1584, Elizabeth gave Raleigh a grant to explore and settle lands in North America.

Why did Elizabeth wish to establish a colony in North America?

- Could act as a base for attacking Spanish interests in the area

- Could be used to launch raids on the Spanish West Indies and annual treasure fleets.

- Could prevent the Spanish and French from settling there

- Could provide the prospect of a better life for the growing number of poor in England

- Could be used to gain access to rich local resources including minerals

- Could add to the territories under the English crown and therefore increase its prestige

Raleigh's 1585 Voyage

- April 1584: Raleigh dispatched two small ships on a reconnaissance mission to the area of modern-day North Carolina.

- Commanders returned with enthusiastic reports of a fertile land, full of animals and civilised Native Americans.

- Raleigh then organised his first expedition: 108 male settlers, under the command of Ralph Lane then set sail for America under the command of Ralph Lane and Sir Richard Grenville

- Grenville's ship - The Tiger - hit rocks as it came into land and seawater damaged supplies and seed crops.

- Construction of a fort was begun, but after a couple of months Grenville returned to England to search out more men and supplies.

- Relations with the Native Americans declined in his absence and and Lane was forced to abandon Roanoke Island in June 1586.

- Drake landed on Roanoke Island the same month and colonists climbed on his ship and sailed home.

- At court, Lane enthused about the virtues of Chesapeake bay as the best place for a settlement and Raleigh was knighted by the Queen and made 'Lord and Governor of Virginia'

Raleigh's 1587 Voyage

- Raleigh was determined to learn from the first colony's failure

- His second expedition took settler families rather than soldiers and headed further north to Chesapeake Bay (a better harbour)

- John White led this expedition.

- The expedition did not make it to Chesapeake Bay as the master pilot, Simon Fernandes refused to travel further as he was worried about hurricanes.

- A second colony was established, but it was too late to plant seeds and relations with the Native Americans were again poor.

- White decided to return to England to bring back supplies, but these were needed for the Armada.

- When he returned to Roanoke in 1590, he found the settlers had disappeared - later known as the 'lost colony'

Why did Raleigh's settlements fail?

- Food supplies did not survive the journey

- Seeds were sown at the wrong time of year

- Lack of a good harbour

- Starvation

- Disease

- Colonists depended on Native Americans for food

- Relations with the Native Americans deteriorated

- Failure of the ships to return from England with fresh supplies and men

What was the significance of Raleigh's expeditions?

- Voyages laid the foundations for the eventual colonisation of America by the English in the 17th century

- Both returned a profit due to captured Spanish ships

- Both excited merchants as they provided merchants with new goods to trade e.g. potato

- They increased knowledge of the continent through increased navigational knowledge, descriptions from Thomas Hariot (Raleigh's assistant in 1585) of plants, animals and minerals and the paintings of John White provided remarkable evidence of Native peoples and places.