What do you think is happening and why?

1. What do you think is happening and why?

2. Why were the poor treated so harshly under the Tudors?

3. By the end of this section you should be able to … • Understand the ways in which social and economic changes can effect what is considered to be a crime • Explain why begging concerned wealthy and powerful people by the 16th century.

6. The Bristler The Bristler would use specially weighted dice (‘bristles’ were loaded or crooked dice), which would land on whichever number the Bristler chose.

7. The Counterfeit Crank Dressed in old, grubby clothes, he would pretend to have violent fits. He would often suck soap so that he frothed at the mouth! The worse he shook, the more money he hoped to attract.

8. The Clapper Dudgeon He would cut his skin to make it bleed and tie dirty rags over the wounds to make it look even worse. He hoped people would feel sorry for him and give him money so he could get medical attention.

9. The Baretop Trickster She would flash a man in the street and ask him to buy her a meal. The man, thinking he might get to have sex with the woman, would follow her to a nearby house. . . Where a vicious gang would be waiting to rob him!

10. Tom O'Bedlam He would pretend to be mad and follow people around. Often he would carry a stick with a piece of meat attached to the end or spend hours barking like a dog or stuffing chicken heads into his ears.

11. ‘Sturdy’ or ‘Deserving’? Some places, such as York, issued badges to sick or injured beggars, who were thought to deserve help (the ‘deserving poor’). This separated them from those considered lazy – called ‘sturdy beggars’.

12. 1495 Monarch: Henry VII Beggars to go into the stocks for three days, then sent back to their place of birth or previous residence (where they last lived).

13. 1531 Monarch: Henry VIII Some ‘worthy poor’, old, and sick given licence to beg. Others should be whipped and sent back to where they came from. Harsher punishments for repeat offenders.

14. 1547 Monarch: Edward VI Beggars whipped and branded with a V on forehead (for vagabond). Also to be made a slave for two years. If they offend again or try to escape, they will be executed (this law remained in force for three years before it was changed back to the 1531 law because it was viewed as too severe)

15. 1601 Monarch: Elizabeth I Local taxes should help the poor. Poor people who refuse to work should be imprisoned. Beggars will sill be whipped until they bleed and sent back to where they came from.

16. Who Were The 'Sturdy Beggars'? Q) What was the difference between a ‘sturdy beggar’ and on of the ‘deserving poor’? How did the law treat them differently?

18. Exam style question 1 • What can you learn from Sources A and B about changes in how seriously begging was treated by the law? (4 marks) • Basic 1-2 marks: The answer gives details from the sources but does not identify change • Good 3-4 marks: The answer identifies change and uses information from both sources to support (identify and explain) the change. Source A. A beggar is tied and whipped through the streets (1567) Source B. Vagabonds and Beggars Act (1494) ‘Vagabonds , idle and suspected persons shall be set in the stocks for three days and three nights and have none other sustenance but bread and water and then shall be put out of town. Every beggar suitable to work shall resort to the Hundred where he last dwelled, is best known, or was born and there remain.’ [Hundred – An area of administration, a little like counties today]

19. What might the following people think about the growing number of beggars and the threat they pose to law and order? An unemployed cloth worker An Elizabethan landowner