Poverty

In Elizabethan England, poverty meant struggling to obtain necessities such as food, clothing and shelter. A labourer could work regularly and still be poor if wages did not cover the cost of feeding a family. Illness, old age or the loss of a household’s main wage-earner could also leave people unable to support themselves.

Poverty did not make every resident a criminal: the important connections are between insecure incomes, crowded living conditions, vulnerability and opportunities to commit or conceal offences.

Poverty meant being unable to afford necessities such as food, clothing and shelter. It was not new in Elizabethan England, but it became a particularly serious problem towards the end of Elizabeth I’s reign. In towns, poor people begged and slept in the streets.