trading companies in London ceased to be associated only with their
traditional goods and were dominated by merchants whose main interest
was in the cloth trade. Ambitious merchants joined a livery company to
become freemen of the city and for the status and social benefits of
membership. The companies still made charitable endowments, had funeral
feasts, cared for the welfare of guild members, and made lavish displays
of pageantry. They were intimately involved with the government of the
city. They supplied members for the Court of Aldermen, which relied on
the companies to maintain the City's emergency grain stores, to assess
and collect taxes, to provide loans to the Crown, to control prices and
markets, to provide armed men when trouble was expected, and to raise
armies for the Crown at times of rebellion, war, or visits from foreign
monarchs. From about 1540 to 1700, there were 23% involved in cloth or
clothing industries such as weavers, tailors, hosiers, haberdashers, and
cappers. 9% were leatherworkers such as skinners; tanners; those in the
heavy leather crafts such as shoemakers, saddlers, and cobblers; and
those in the light leather crafts such as glovers and pursers. Another
9% worked in metals, such as the armorers, smiths, cutlers, locksmiths,
and coppersmiths. 8% worked in the building trades. The victualing
trades, such as bakers, brewers, butchers, costermongers [sold fruit and
vegetables from a cart or street stand], millers, fishmongers,
oystermen, and tapsters [bartender], grew from 9% before 1600 to 16% by
1700. Of London's workforce, 60% were involved in production; 13% were
merchants before 1600; 7% were merchants by 1700; 7% were transport
workers such as watermen, sailors, porters, coachmen, and shipwrights;
and 5-9% were professionals and officials (this number declining). Life
in London was lived in the open air in the streets. The merchant
transacted business agreements and the attorney saw his clients in the
street or at certain pillars at St. Paul's Church, where there was a
market for all kinds of goods and services, including gentlemen's
valets, groceries, spirits, books, and loans, which continued even
during the daily service. Some gentlemen had offices distant from their
dwelling houses such as attorneys, who had a good income from trade
disputes and claims to land, which often changed hands. Plays and
recreation also occurred in the streets, such as performances by
dancers, musicians, jugglers, clowns, tumblers, magicians, and men who
swallowed fire. The churches were continuously open and used by trades
and peddlers, including tailors and letter-writers. Water carriers
carried water in wood vessels on their shoulders from the Thames River
or its conduits to the inhabitants three gallons at a time. A gentleman
concocted an engine to convey Thames water by lead pipes up into men's
houses in a certain section of the city. In 1581, a man took out a lease
on one of the arches of London Bridge. There he built a waterwheel from
which he pumped water to residents who lived beside the bridge.
Soldiers, adventurers, physicians, apprentices, prostitutes, and cooks
were all distinguishable by their appearances. An ordinance required
apprentices to wear long blue gowns and white breeches with stockings,
with no ornamentation of silk, lace, gold or silver and no jewelry. They
could wear a meat knife, but not a sword or dagger. Apprentices lived
with their masters and worked from 6 or 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Some people
knitted wool caps as they walked to later sell. There were sections of
town for booksellers, butchers, brewers, hosiers, shoemakers, curriers,
cooks, poulters, bow makers, textwriters, pattenmakers, and horse and
oxen sellers. Large merchant companies had great halls for trade, such
as the mercers, grocers, drapers, fishmongers, and goldsmiths. The other
great guilds were the skinners, merchant tailers, salters, haberdashers,
ironmongers, vintners, and clothworkers. Smaller guilds were those of
the bakers, weavers, fruiterers, dyers, Thames watermen and lightermen,
carpenters, joiners, turners, and parish clerks. The guilds insured
quality by inspecting goods for a fee.
About 1571, mercer and Merchant Adventurer Thomas Gresham established
the Royal Exchange as a place for merchants and brokers to meet for
business purposes. It became the center of London's business life. Its
great bell rang at midday and at 6 p.m. Its courtyard was lined with
shops that rented at 50s. yearly and became a popular social and
recreational area. Gresham formulated his law that when two kinds of
money of equal denomination but unequal intrinsic value are in
circulation at the same time, the one of greater value will tend to be
hoarded or exported, i.e. bad money will drive good money out of
circulation.
The work-saving knitting frame was invented in 1589 by minister William
Lee; it knit crosswise loops using one continuous yarn and was operated
by hand. The stocking knitters, who knitted by hand, put up a bitter
struggle against its use and chased Lee out of the country. But it did
come into use. Some framework stocking knitters paid frame rent for the
use of their knitting frames. Frame knitting became a scattered
industry.
By 1600 basement services were frequently found in town houses built on
restricted sites in London. Lastly, provision of water supplies and
improved sanitary arrangements reflected concern with private and public
health. There was virtually no drainage. In the case of town houses,
some owners would go to considerable effort to solve drainage problems,
often paying cash to the civic authorities, but sometimes performing
some service for the town at Court or at Westminster, in return for
unlimited water or some drainage. Most affluent households, including
the Queen's, moved from house to house, so their cesspits could be
cleaned out and the vacated buildings aired after use. A few cesspits
were made air tight. Otherwise, there was extensive burning of incense.
Refuse was emptied out of front doors and shoveled into heaps on street
corners. It was then dumped into the Thames or along the highways
leading out of town. People put on perfume to avoid the stench. By 1600,
the first toilet and water closet, where water flushed away the waste,
was built. This provided a clean toilet area all year round. But these
toilets were not much used because of sewer smells coming from them. The
sky above London was darkened somewhat by the burning of coal in houses.
Taverns served meals as well as ale. They were popular meeting places
for both men and women of all backgrounds to met their friends. Men went
to taverns for camaraderie and to conduct business. Women usually went
to taverns with each other. Two taverns in particular were popular with
the intelligentsia. Music was usually played in the background and games
were sometimes played. Beer made with hops and malt was introduced and
soon there were beer drinking contests. Drunkenness became a problem.
At night, the gates of the city were closed and citizens were expected
to hang out lanterns. The constable and his watchmen carried lanterns
and patrolled the streets asking anyone they saw why they were out so
late at night. Crime was rampant in the streets and criminals were
executed near to the crime scene.
There were a few horse-drawn coaches with leather flaps or curtains in
the unglazed windows to keep out the weather. The main thoroughfare in
London was still the Thames River. Nobles, peers, and dignitaries living
on the Thames had their own boats and landings. Also at the banks,
merchants of all nations had landing places where ships unloaded,
warehouses, and cellars for goods and merchandise. Swans swam in the
clear bright water. Watermen rowed people across the Thames for a fee.
In Southwark were theaters, outlaws, cutpurses, prostitutes, and
prisons. In 1550 Southwark became the 26th and last ward of London. In
the summer, people ate supper outside in public.
As of old times, brokers approved by the Mayor and aldermen made
contracts with merchants concerning their wares. Some contracts included
holding wares as security. Some craftsmen and manual workers extended
this idea to used garments and household articles, which they took as
pawns, or security for money loaned. This began pawn brokerage, which
was lucrative. The problem was that many of the items pawned had been
stolen.
Elizabeth had good judgment in selecting her ministers and advisors for
her Privy Council, which was organized like Henry VIII's Privy Council.
The Queen's Privy Council of about twelve ministers handled foreign
affairs, drafted official communiques, issued proclamations, supervised
the county offices: the 1500 Justices of the Peace, chief constables,
sheriffs, lord lieutenants, and the county militias. It fixed wages and
prices in London, advised Justices of the Peace on wages elsewhere, and
controlled exports of grain to keep prices down and supplies ample. It
banned the eating of meat two days a week so that the fishing industry
and port towns would prosper. When grain was scarce in 1596, Elizabeth
made a proclamation against those ingrossers, forestallers, and
ingraters of grain who increased its price by spreading false rumors
that it was scarce because much of it was being exported, which was
forbidden. There were labor strikes in some towns for higher wages after
periods of inflation. In 1591, London authorities rounded up the sturdy
vagabonds and set them to work cleaning out the city ditches for 4d. per
day.
Elizabeth did not allow any gentleman to live in London purely for
pleasure, but sent those not employed by the Court back to their country
manors to take care of and feed the poor of their parishes. Her
proclamation stated that "sundry persons of ability that had intended to
save their charges by living privately in London or towns corporate,
thereby leaving their hospitality and the relief of their poor
neighbors, are charged not to break up their households; and all others
that have of late time broken up their households to return to their
houses again without delay." She never issued a license for more than
100 retainers. She was partially successful in stopping Justices of the
Peace and sheriffs from wearing the liveries of great men. She continued
the policy of Henry VII to replace the rule of force by the rule of law.
Service of the crown and influence at court became a better route to
power and fortune than individual factions based on local power
structures. At the lowest level, bribery became more effective than
bullying. The qualities of the courtier, such as wit, and the lawyer
became more fashionable than the qualities of the soldier.
Most of the men in Elizabeth's court had attended a university, such as
Francis Bacon, son of the Lord Keeper, who became a writer, attorney,
member of the Commons, and experimental philosopher; and Walter Ralegh,
the writer and sea fighter, who had a humble origin. Many wives and
daughters of Privy Councilors attended the Queen in her privy chamber.
Most of the knights or gentlemen of the royal household were also
members of Parliament or Justices of the Peace for certain districts in
the counties. Instead of the office of Chancellor, which was the highest
legal office, Elizabeth appointed a man of common birth to be Lord
Keeper of the Great Seal; she never made a Lord Keeper a peer. Elizabeth
encouraged her lords to frankly make known their views to her, in public
or in private, before she decided on a course of action. She had
affectionate nicknames for her closest courtiers, and liked to make
puns. The rooms of the Queen were arranged as they had been under Henry
VIII: the great hall was the main dining room where the servants ate and
which Elizabeth attended on high days and holidays; the great chamber
was the main reception room, where her gentlemen and yeomen of the guard
waited; the presence chamber was where she received important visitors;
beyond lay her privy chamber and her bedchamber. She ate her meals in
the privy chamber attended only by her ladies. She believed that a light
supper was conducive to good health. The Lord Chamberlain attended the
Queen's person and managed her privy chamber and her well-born grooms
and yeomen and ladies-in-waiting. The Lord Steward managed the domestic
servants below the stairs, from the Lord Treasurer to the cooks and
grooms of the stable. The court did not travel as much as in the past,
but became associated with London. Elizabeth took her entire court on
summer visits to the country houses of leading nobility and gentry.
Courtiers adopted symbolic "devices" as statements of their reaction to
life or events, e.g. a cupid firing arrows at a unicorn signified
chastity under attack by sexual desire. They carried them enameled on
jewels, had them painted in the background of their portraits, and
sometimes had them expressed on furniture, plate, buildings, or food.
The authority of the Queen was the authority of the state. Elizabeth's
experience led her to believe that it was most important for a monarch
to have justice, temperance, magnanimity, and judgment. She claimed that
she never set one person before another, but upon just cause, and had
never preferred anyone to office for the preferrer's sake, but only when
she believed the person worthy and fit for the office. She never blamed
those who did their best and never discharged anyone form office except
for cause. Further, she had never been partial or prejudiced nor had
listened to any person contrary to law to pervert her verdicts. She
never credited a tale that was first told to her and never corrupted her
judgment with a censure before she had heard the cause. She did not
think that the glory of the title of monarch made all she did lawful. To
her, clemency was as eminent in supreme authority as justice and
severity.
Secular education and especially the profession of law was now the
route for an able but poor person to rise to power, rather than as
formerly through military service or through the church.
The first stage of education was primary education, which was devoted
to learning to read and write in English. This was carried out at
endowed schools or at home by one's mother or a tutor. The children of
the gentry were usually taught in their homes by private teachers of
small classes. Many of the poor became literate enough to read the Bible
and to write letters. However, most agricultural workers and laborers
remained illiterate. They signed with an "x", which represented the
Christian cross and signified its solemnity. Children of the poor were
expected to work from the age of 6 or 7.
The next stage of education was grammar [secondary] school or a private
tutor. A student was taught rhetoric (e.g. poetry, history, precepts of
rhetoric, and classical oratory), some logic, and Latin and Greek
grammar. English grammar was learned through Latin grammar and English
style through translation from Latin. As a result, they wrote English in
a Latin style. Literary criticism was learned through rhetoric. There
were disputations on philosophical questions such as how many angels
could sit on a pin's point, and at some schools, orations. The students
sat in groups around the hall for their lessons. The boys and some girls
were also taught hawking, hunting and archery. There were no
playgrounds. The grammar student and the undergraduate were tested for
proficiency by written themes and oral disputations, both in Latin. The
middle classes from the squire to the petty tradesman were brought into
contact with the works of the best Greek and Roman writers. The best
schools and many others had the students read Cicero - the "De
Officiis", the epistles and orations; and some of Ovid, Terence,
Sallust, Virgil, some medieval Latin works, the "Distichs" of Cato, and
sometimes Erasmus and Sir Thomas More. The students also had to repeat
prayers, recite the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments, and to
memorize catechisms. Because the students came from the various social
classes such as gentlemen, parsons, yeomen, mercers, and masons, they
learned to be on friendly and natural terms with other classes. A
typical school-day lasted from 7:00 AM to 5:00 PM. There were so many
grammar schools founded and financed by merchants and guilds such as the
Mercers and Fishmongers that every incorporated town had at least one.
Grammar schools were headed by schoolmasters, who were licensed by the
bishop and paid by the town. Flogging with a birch rod was used for
discipline. However, the grammar schools did not become the breeding
grounds for humanist ideas because the sovereigns were faced with
religious atomism and political unrest, so used the grammar schools to
maintain public order and achieve political and religious conformity.
Many grammar schools had preparatory classes called "petties" for boys
and girls who could not read and write to learn to do so. The girls did
not usually stay beyond the age of nine. This was done by a
schoolmaster's assistant, a parish clerk, or some older boys.
Some founders of grammar schools linked their schools with particular
colleges in the universities following the example of Winchester being
associated with New College, Oxford; and Eton with King's College,
Cambridge. The new charter of Westminster in 1560 associated the school
with Christ Church, Oxford and Trinity College, Cambridge.
The government of Oxford University, which had been Catholic, was taken
from the resident teachers and put into the hands of the
Vice-Chancellor, Doctors, Heads of Colleges, and Proctors. Cambridge
already had a strong reformed element from Erasmus' influence. Oxford
University and Cambridge University were incorporated to have a
perpetual existence for the virtuous education of youth and maintenance
of good literature. The Chancellors, masters, and scholars had a common
seal. Oxford was authorized to and did acquire its own printing press.
Undergraduate students entered about age 16 and resided in rooms in
colleges rather than in scattered lodgings. The graduate fellows of the
college who were M.A.s of under three years standing had the
responsibility, instead of the university, for teaching the
undergraduates. This led many to regard their fellowship as a position
for life rather than until they completed their post-graduate studies.
But they were still required to resign on marrying or taking up an
ecclesiastical benefice. The undergraduates were fee-paying members of
the college or poor scholars. Some of the fee-paying members or
gentlemen-commoners or fellow-commoners were the sons of the nobility
and gentry and even shared the fellows' table. The undergraduate
students were required to have a particular tutors, who were responsible
for their moral behavior as well as their academic studies. It was
through the tutors that modern studies fit for the education of a
Renaissance gentleman became the norm. Those students not seeking a
degree could devise their own courses of study with their tutors'
permission. Less than about 40% stayed long enough to get a degree. Many
students who were working on the seven year program for a Master's
Degree went out of residence at college after the four year's "bachelor"
course. Students had text books to read rather than simply listening to
a teacher read books to them.
In addition to the lecturing of the M.A.s and the endowed university
lectureships, the university held exercises every Monday, Wednesday, and
Friday in which the student was meant through disputation, to apply the
formal precepts in logic and rhetoric to the practical business of
public speaking and debate. Final examinations were still by
disputation. The students came to learn to read Latin easily. Students
acted in Latin plays. If a student went to a tavern, he could be
flogged. For too elaborate clothing, he could be fined. Fines for
absence from class were imposed. However, from this time until 1945, a
young man's university days were regarded as a period for the "sowing of
wild oats".
All students had to reside in a college or hall, subscribe to the 39
articles of the university, the Queen's supremacy, and the prayer book.
Meals were taken together in the college halls. The universities were
divided into three tables: a fellows' table of earls, barons, gentlemen,
and doctors; a second table of masters of arts, bachelors, and eminent
citizens, and a third table of people of low condition. Professors,
doctors, masters of arts and students were all distinguishable by their
gowns.
Undergraduate education was considered to be for the purpose of good
living as well as good learning. It was to affect the body, mind,
manners, sentiment, and business, instead of just leading to becoming a
better disputant. The emphasis on manners came mostly from an Italian
influence. The university curriculum included Latin and Greek languages
and was for four years. The student spent at least one year on logic
(syllogizing, induction, deduction, fallacies, and the application of
logic to other studies), at least one year on rhetoric, and at least one
year on philosophy. The latter included physics, metaphysics, history,
law, moral and political philosophy, modern languages, and ethics
(domestic principles of government, military history, diplomatic
history, and public principles of government), and mathematics
(arithmetic, geometry, algebra, music, optics, astronomy). The astronomy
taught was that of Ptolemy, whose view was that the celestial bodies
revolved around a spherical earth, on which he had laid out lines of
longitude and latitude. There were lectures on Greek and Latin
literature, including Aristotle, Plato, and Cicero. There were no
courses on English history in the universities.
About 1564, the curriculum was changed to two terms of grammar, four
terms of rhetoric, five terms of dialectic (examining ideas and opinions
logically, e.g. ascertaining truth by analyzing words in their context
and equivocations), three terms of arithmetic, and two terms of music.
There were now negative numbers, irrational numbers such as square roots
of non-integers, and imaginary numbers such as square roots of negative
numbers. The circumference and area of a circle could be computed from
its radius, and the Pythagorean theorem related the three sides of a
right triangle. Also available were astrology, alchemy (making various
substances such as acids and alcohols), cultivation of gardens, and
breeding of stock, especially dogs and horses. Astronomy, geometry,
natural and moral philosophy, and metaphysics were necessary for a
master's degree. The university libraries of theological manuscripts in
Latin were supplemented with many non-religious books.
There were graduate studies in theology, medicine, music, and law,
which was a merging of civil and canon law together with preparatory
work for studying common law at the Inns of Court in London.
In London, legal training was given at the four Inns of Court. Students
were called to dinner by a horn. Only young gentry were admitted there.
A year's residence there after university gave a gentleman's son enough
law to decide disputes of tenants on family estates or to act as Justice
of the Peace in his home county. A full legal education gave him the
ability to handle all family legal matters, including property matters.
Many later became Justices of the Peace or members of Parliament.
Students spent two years in the clerks' commons, and two in the masters'
commons. Besides reading textbooks in Latin, the students observed at
court and did work for practicing attorneys. After about four more
years' apprenticeship, a student could be called to the outer bar. There
was a real bar of iron or wood separating the justices from the
attorneys and litigants. As "Utter Barrister" or attorney, he would
swear to "do no falsehood in the court, increase no fees but be
contented with the old fees accustomed, delay no man for lucre or
malice, but use myself in the office of an Attorney within the Court
according to my learning and discretion, so help me God, Amen". Students
often also studied and attended lectures on astronomy, geography,
history, mathematics, theology, music, navigation, foreign languages,
and lectures on anatomy and medicine sponsored by the College of
Physicians. A tour of the continent became a part of every gentleman's
education. After about eight years' experience, attorneys could become
Readers, who gave lecturess; or Benchers, who made the rules. Benchers,
who were elected by other Benchers, were entrusted with the government
of their Inn of Court, and usually were King's counsel. Five to ten
years later, a few of these were picked by the Queen for Serjeant at
Law, and therefore eligible to plead at the bar of common pleas.
Justices were chosen from the Serjeants at Law.
Gresham left the Royal exchange to the city and the Mercer's Company on
condition that they use some of its profits to appoint and pay seven
lecturers in law, rhetoric, divinity, music, physics, geometry, and
astronomy to teach at his mansion, which was called Gresham College.
They were installed in 1598 according to his Will. Their lectures were
free, open to all, and often in English. They embraced mathematics and
new scientific ideas and emphasized their practical applications. A
tradition of research and teaching was established in mathematics and
astronomy.
There were language schools teaching French, Italian, and Spanish to the
aspiring merchant and to gentlemen's sons and daughters.