The investigation, whose conclusions are partly described in the following treatise, was undertaken with a view to discovering the actual circumstances of women’s lives in the Seventeenth Century. It is perhaps impossible to divest historical enquiry from all personal bias, but in this case the bias has simply consisted in a conviction that the conditions under which the obscure mass of women live and fulfil their duties as human beings, have a vital influence upon the destinies of the human rac

Effect of environment on Women’s development. Possible reaction on men’s development—Importance of seventeenth century in historic development of English women—Influence of economic position—Division of Women’s productive powers into Domestic, Industrial, and Professional—Three systems of Industrial Organisation—Domestic Industry—Family Industry—Capitalistic Industry or Industrialism—Definition of these terms—Historic sequence. Effect of Industrial Revolution on Women—in capitalistic class—in ag

Term includes aristocracy and nouveau riche . Tendency of these two classes to approximate in manners—Activity of aristocratic women with affairs of household, estate and nation—Zeal for patents and monopolies—Money lenders—Shipping trade—Contractors—Joan Dant—Dorothy Petty—Association of wives in husbands’ businesses—Decrease of women’s business activity in upper classes—Contrast of Dutch women—Growing idleness of gentlewomen. Perhaps it is impossible to say what exactly constitutes a capitalis

However important the women who were the mothers of the race may appear to modern eyes, their history was unnoticed by their contemporaries and no analysis was made of their development. The existence of vigorous, able matrons was accepted as a matter of course. They embodied the seventeenth century idea of the “eternal feminine” and no one suspected that they might change with a changing environment. They themselves were too busy, too much absorbed in the lives of others, to keep journals and t

Husbandmen were probably the most numerous class in the village community. Possessed of a small holding at a fixed customary rent and with rights of grazing on the common, they could maintain a position of independence. Statute 31 Eliz., forbidding the erection of cottages without four acres of land attached, was framed with the intention of protecting the husbandman against the encroachments of capitalists, for a family which could grow its own supply of food on four acres of land would be larg

In some respects it is less difficult to visualise the lives of women in the wage-earning class than in the class of farmers and husbandmen. The narrowness of their circumstances and the fact that their destitution brought them continually under the notice of the magistrates at Quarter Sessions have preserved data in greater completeness from which to reconstruct the picture. Had this information been wanting such a reconstruction would have demanded no vivid imagination, because the results of

The interest of the Government and of all those who studied financial and economic questions, was focussed upon the Woollen Trade, owing to the fact that it formed one of the chief sources of revenue for the Crown. At the close of the seventeenth century woollen goods formed a third of the English exports. [182] Historically the Woollen Trade has a further importance, due to the part which it played in the development of capitalism. The manufacture of woollen materials had existed in the remote

While the woollen trade had for centuries been developing under the direction of capitalism, it was only in the seventeenth century that this influence begins to show itself in the production of linen. Following the example of the clothiers, attempts were then made to manufacture linen on a large scale. For example, Celia Fiennes describes Malton as a “pretty large town built of Stone but poor; ... there was one Mr. Paumes that marry’d a relation of mine, Lord Ewers’ Coeheiress who is landlady o

The history of the Silk Trade differs widely from that of either the Woollen or Linen Trades. The conditions of its manufacture during the fifteenth century are described with great clearness in a petition presented to Henry VI. by the silk weavers in 1455, which “Sheweth unto youre grete wisdoms, and also prayen and besechen the Silkewymmen and Throwestres of the Craftes and occupation of Silkewerk within the Citee of London, which be and have been Craftes of wymmen within the same Citee of tym

It has been shown that in textile industries all spinning was done exclusively by women and children, while they were also engaged to some extent in other processes, such as weaving, burling, bleaching, fulling, etc. The fact that the nation depended entirely upon women for the thread from which its clothing and household linen was made must be remembered in estimating their economic position. Even if no other work had fallen to their share, they can hardly have been regarded as mere dependants

The origin of the Craft Gilds is obscure. They were preceded by Religious Gilds in which men and women who were associated in certain trades united for religious and social purposes. Whether these Religious Gilds developed naturally into organisations concerned with the purpose of trade, or whether they were superseded by new associations whose first object was the regulation and improvement of the craft and with whom the religious and social ceremonies were of secondary importance is a disputed

The want of technical skill and knowledge which so often hampered the position of women in the Skilled Trades, was a smaller handicap in Retail Trades, where manual dexterity and technical knowledge are less important than general intelligence and a lively understanding of human nature. Quick perception and social tact, which are generally supposed to be feminine characteristics, often proved useful even to the craftsman, when his wife assumed the charge of the financial side of his business; it

Under this head are grouped the Bakers, Millers, Butchers and Fishwives, together with the Brewers, Inn-keepers and Vintners, the category embracing both those who produced and those who retailed the provisions in question. A large proportion both of the bread and beer consumed at this time was produced by women in domestic industry. The wages assessments show that on the larger farms the chief woman servant was expected both to brew and to bake, but the cottage folk in many cases cannot have po

The foregoing examination of the relation of women to the different crafts and trades has shown them occupying an assured position wherever the system of family industry prevailed. While this lasted the detachment of married women from business is nowhere assumed, but they are expected to assist their husband, and during his absence or after his death to take his place as head of the family and manager of the business. The economic position held by women depended upon whether the business was ca

Similar tendencies to those which affected the industrial position of women can be traced in the professions also, showing that, important as was the influence of capitalistic organisation in the history of women’s evolution, other powerful factors were working in the same direction. Three professions were closed to women in the seventeenth century, Arms, the Church and the Law. The Law. —It must be remembered that the mass of the “common people” were little affected by “the law” before the seve

Whatever arrangements had been made by the religious orders in England for the care of the sick poor were swept away by the Reformation. The provision which existed in the seventeenth century for this purpose rested on a lay basis, quite unconnected with the Church. Amongst the most famous charitable institutions were the four London Hospitals; Christ’s Hospital for children under the age of sixteen, St. Bartholomew’s and St. Thomas’s for the sick and impotent poor, and Bethlehem for the insane.

The position held by mediæval women in the arts of healing is shown in such books as Mallory’s “Morte d’Arthur.” When wounds proved intractable to the treatment of the rough and ready surgeons who attended in the vicinity of tourneys, knights sought help from some high-born lady renowned for her skill in medicine. It is true that popular belief assigned her success to witchcraft rather than to the knowledge and understanding acquired by diligent study and experience, but a tendency to faith in t

It has been shown that the employment of women in the arts of medicine, nursing and teaching was chiefly, though not entirely, confined to the domestic sphere; midwifery, on the other hand, though occasionally practised by amateurs, was, in the majority of cases, carried on by women who, whether skilled or unskilled, regarded it as the chief business of their lives, and depended upon it for their maintenance. Not only did midwifery exist on a professional basis from immemorial days, but it was f

The foregoing examination of the character and extent of women’s professional services has brought several interesting points to light. It has been shown that when social organisation rested upon the basis of the family, as it chiefly did up to the close of the Middle Ages, many of the services which are now ranked as professional were thought to be specially suited to the genius of women, and were accordingly allotted to them in the natural division of labour within the family. The suggestions

Great productive capacity of women under conditions of Family and Domestic Industry—no difference between efficiency of labour when applied for domestic purposes or for trade. Rate of wages no guide to real value of goods produced—married women unlikely to work for wages when possessing capital for domestic industry—Women’s productiveness in textile industries—Agriculture—Other industries—Professional services. Capitalism effected economic revolution in women’s position—By ( a ) substitution of

Account of Several Workhouses for Employing and Maintaining the Poor, etc. London 1725. 1027 i. 18 (9). Act of Common Council for the reformation of sundry abuses practised by divers persons upon the common markets and streets of the City of London. 1631. 21 l. 5. (4). Act for the settlement and well ordering of the severall Publick Markets within the City of London. 1674. 21 l. 5 (58). Acts and Ordinances of the Interregnum II. 1651. Add. MSS. 36308. Answer to a Paper of Reflections on the Proj