What was it like to be poor in the 1700s?

What was it like to be poor in the 1700s?

Poverty rates throughout the 1700s were high. Many families struggled to pay for their daily bread, and lived below the ‘breadline’ in abject conditions. Some workhouses were clean and comfortable havens for the poor. Many provided education, rudimentary health care and clean clothing.

How did the poor live in the 18th century?

Poor people ate rather plain and monotonous diets made up primarily of bread and potatoes; meat was an uncommon luxury. Poor craftsmen and laborers lived in just two or three rooms, and the poorest families lived in just one room with very simple and plain furniture.

How were poor people treated in the 18th century?

In the 18th century those who were too ill, old, destitute, or who were orphaned children were put into a local ‘workhouse’ or ‘poorhouse’. Those able to work, but whose wages were too low to support their families, received ‘relief in aid of wages’ in the form of money, food and clothes.

How poor were people in the Middle Ages?

Poverty in the Middle Ages The poor were not considered important. Much more was written about the rich and powerful. However, in the Middle Ages, poverty was common. England was basically a subsistence economy where each village made most of the things it needed and most of the population were subsistence farmers.

What was America like in 1700s?

At first, life was hard and rough in the North American colonies. However, by the early 18th century people in the American colonies lived in houses as comfortable as those in Europe. Wealthy people had finely carved furniture, wallpaper, china, silver, and crystal and chairs were common.

What was England like in the 1700s?

Cities were dirty, noisy, and overcrowded. London had about 600,000 people around 1700 and almost a million residents in 1800. The rich, only a tiny minority of the population, lived luxuriously in lavish, elegant mansions and country houses, which they furnished with comfortable, upholstered furniture.

Who are the poor in the 17th century?

Together with all those groups of poor already mentioned and which comprise the majority sector of French society in the 17th century, we can also allude to some more specific types which have a concrete relation to Vincent de Paul: the foundlings, the galley slaves, the humiliated poor.

How did society change in the 1670s and 1750s?

In the period between the 1670’s and 1750’s, sweeping changes transformed both the the public social lives and private family lives of the British people. Increased literacy, combined with The Restoration led the British people to an increasingly public life.

What was family life like in the 17th century?

The life of an average family in late 17th century England was simple, let laborious. Many lived in one or two room houses that were often crowded with large families, as well as lodgers that shared their living space. Women typically gave birth to eight to ten children; however, due to high mortality rates, only raised five or six children.

What did children of poor families do for a living?

The children of average or poor families began working very early on in life, sometimes even as early as age seven. They worked mostly on farms as shepherds, cowherds, or apprentices and often left home to do so.