1500-1700 - Early Modern

• Queen Elizabeth:

  • Encouraged exploration & colonisation
  • Expansion & establishment of oversees empire
  • Established Protestant church of England: solidifying position as official religion
  • Placed policies protecting Protestant worship & Policies supressing Catholic influence
  • Had a patronage for arts & literature = created natural, cultural renaissance
• Martin Luther:

  • Him & his followers created split in Catholic church
  • Criticised Catholic church for their corruption through abusive power from pre-bishops & pope
  • 1517 = Published 95 thesis sparking reformation
• Oliver Cromwell:

  • Dissolved monarchy & formed Commonwealth Republican Government
  • Established new model army (highly disciplined & professional = helping win wars)
  • Persecution of Catholics - banned religious practice
• Emerging Prostatism:

  • (1509-47) Henry VIII became head church of England
  • (1547-53) Edward VI changed England back to Protestant country
  • (1553-58) Mary I turned England back into catholic country
  • (1558-1603) Elizabeth I changed England fully Protestant country - where pope had no power
• Religious changes:

  • England became protestant country (free from power of pope)
  • Europe still part of Christendom
  • Huguenots saw England as place of safety (bringing wealth & new ideas)
• Economic growth:

  • Global trading companies developed routes to Africa, Europe, India
  • Privateering increased
  • Merchants traded wide range of goods
  • Cloth trade dominated England's prosperity
  • Transatlantic slave trade began
• Government change:

  • Parliament passed laws to encourage settlement
  • New laws supported growth of trade & setting up of trading companies
  • Jews able to return to England = Oliver Cromwell & protectorate
• Why did Huguenots migrate?

  • Protestants = left France due to persecution by Catholic authorities (seeking refuge in Protestant England)
  • 1572 = St Bartholomew's Day massacre (10,000 killed) = few migrated
  • Migration increased in 1685 - King Louis XIV made it illegal for French to be Protestant (40,000-50,000 Huguenots arrived in England) = Charles II offered Denizen status
  • Skilled craftworkers wanted to set up businesses & trade
  • Had relatives who were successfully established in England
  • Edward VI allowed French Protestant church to be founded in London
• What was the Denizen status?

  1681 - Charles II allowed migrants to live in England with certain rights
• What was the Foreign Protestants nationality act?

  1709 - allowed European migrants full civil rights in Britain if they swear full loyalty to crown (to attract wealthy businessmen & skilled craftmen from Holland & France)
• Why did the Palatines migrate?

  • 1709 Protestant Neuralisation Act
  • Protestant farmers left Germany 1709 - due to bad harvest, famine, poverty & war - wanted better life
  • Many on way to America (encouraged by British-owned Carolina company & funded by British Government)
  • Very poor skills (except agriculture)
  • Persecuted by Roman Empire
• Why did Indians migrate?

  • East India Company = increased trade taking English people to India where Indian people worked for English families
  • Became lascars & Ayahs returning to England with families they worked for
  • Looking for better life - England offered them better job opportunities
• Why did Africans migrate?

  • Forced out of Spain 1568 (part of Muslim rebellion against Spanish catholic government)
  • Been enslaved but escaped & fled to England
  • Enslaved Africans brough by English owners - forced migration
  • Worked for ordinary people & monarchs (paid equally)
• Why did Jews migrate?

  • Some already remained in England after 1290 expulsion (outwardly converted to Christianity but privately followed Judaism)
  • Antisemitism in Europe
  • English economy weak = allowing Jews to return encouraging successful Jewish merchants to migrate + Expertise = strengthening England
  • 1656 = Oliver Cromwell allowed Jews to return
• Why did Gypsies (Romani) migrate?

  • Nomadic people travelled throughout England & Europe
  • = vagrants & beggars - Governments passed laws to keep them in one place (if they ignored laws & Hanged as punishment)
  • 1650s government transported Romani people into slavery
• Huguenots experience:

  • Range of skills = found work easily & prospered
  • Set up own businesses/worked with friends & family already established
  • Few desperately poos, some took to petty crime
  • 1517 - Riots by people who resented foreigners (accused of undercutting pay)
  • Accepted into society due to church & going habits (clear Protestant, good work ethic)
• Palatines experience:

  • Welcomed by Government
  • Very few skills = struggle to find work = relied on charity (had no friends/families in England)
  • Government no longer willing to fund immigration to America & deported thousands to Ireland to work on land (Irish land = poor quality - not enough crops to support families)
  • Hated by Catholics in Ireland = deported back to England
  • Many sailed to America = dying due to typhoid & immigrant hating mobs
• Jews Experience:

  • Settled in London (where given permission to open Synagogues)
  • working mainly as bankers, doctors, scholars
  • Poor Jews began migrating from Eastern Europe & settled at arrival port (working as doctors, traders, pawnbrokers)
  • Poor & destitute, looked after by communities
  • Still existing antisemitism (described as thieves & scoundrels in songs and pamphlets)
• Indians Experience:

  • Ayahs depended on employees - when children grew up, ayahs passed on to wealthy families or abandoned
  • Lascars settled in ports of London & Liverpool working on docks, in warehouses or pubs = life of hard labour
• Africans experience:

  • Brought to England as servants = working for wealthy (fashionable for English people to have Black children as servants) - runaways from masters due to bad treatment
  • Employed for skilled jobs (equal pay) - some became wealthy
  • Respected & equal members of society
• Huguenot impact:

  • Invested in Sheffield steel industry
  • Started English paper industry
  • Cloth trade boosted - between 1650-1700 cloth exports were 20x greater than between 1600-1650
  • A Huguenot was the first governor of Bank of England
  • New techniques in fashion industry
  • Establish London as major financial centre
  • Huguenots churches seen as respectable (similar to English Protestantism) = Helped bring religious tolerance
• Palatines impact:

  • Britain's first refugee camp
• Jews Impact:

  • Jewish financial invested in businesses - enabled economic growth
  • Helped London turn into major financial centre
  • Jewish had contracts to supply army with equipment (e.g., weapons)
• Indians Impact:

  • Expanded British textile industry & fashion trends (calico & chintz)
• African Impacts:

  • Contribution to economic growth
  • Development of European colonies in America (transatlantic slave trade)
• Flemish weavers impacts (Sandwich & Canterbury)

  • Helped towns prosper
  • Master weavers made high quality goods
  • Introduced celery
• Flemish weavers experience (Sandwich & Canterbury)

  • sold high quality cloth = prosperous
  • Given St Peters church = enabling them to wordship in their own way
  • Original residents complained about them 'stealing jobs' = tensions raised
  • Unable to work in desired sectors (conformed to fishing & weaving industries)
  • very Successful settlements
• Walloon Weavers experience (Sandwich & Canterbury)

  • Given disused monasteries =they converted it into a school, weavers hall & market
  • 12 elders who set rules & kept order in community, worked close with authorities
  • Very successful = produced high quality cloth
  • Increasing Walloon migrants in Canterbury
  • Became rich (built own houses/workshops)
• Walloon weavers impact (Sandwich & Canterbury)

  • Developed new trade links (silk dying & diamond cutting)
  • Increasing Walloon migrants in Canterbury's population
• Flemish weavers in Sandwich

  1. 1561 - officials in town of Snadwich worried about towns declining prosperity & got permission from Elizabeth I's council to invite Flemish to work in only weaving & fishing industries
  2. 1561 - Flemish began to arrive selling high quality woollen cloth twice weekly town market (given St Peters church)
  3. 1569 - People began to complain about the 'stealing jobs' officials ruled they only work in trades, weaving ,fishing
  4. 1582 - 1500 weavers in Sandwich - people appealed to councils officials, council repeated ruling & told people they can move & work elsewhere
• What did the Huguenots experience in Spitalfields & Soho?

  • Extremely wealthy
  • In Spitalfields = skilled businessmen
  • Spitalfields located out of London = weavers free from rules of guilds
  • Opportunity to experiment with sorts of cloth
  • kept own culture; language
  • Accepted by society (protestant values)
  • 1708 Foreign Protestant Nationality Act - allowed more security
  • Declarations = helped & assisted in Huguenots settlement (£64,000 raised to help them settle)
  • English weavers complained of them taking jobs but tensions diffused as they offered to teach their skills
• Why did Huguenots migrate in Spitalfields & Soho?

  • Settled in Spitalfields = cheap housing
  • Plan to invest in silk weaving industry (in Spitalfields)
  • Relatives already settled in England
• What impacts did Huguenots have in Spitalfields & Soho?

  • Large number of workshops built = employed hundreds of weavers
  • England's population of silk fabrics increased (20x)
  • Adapted old houses & built new ones
  • Helped develop Huguenot tolerance
• Cultural impacts:

  • Polydore Vergil - Born in Italy
  • Silk & other new fabrics were used for design & make fashionable clothes
  • first people to write a book about English history
  • Holbein van Dyck & Lely - came from Germany & Netherlands
  • Paint royalty & rich people - paintings were admired & gradually merchants & bankers wanted their portraits painted
  • 1535 = 2/3 of those working in book trade were European
• Dutch agriculture:

  • In 1630 Charles I asked Cornelius Vermuyden to drain the fens, in east England
  • Dutch engineers & labourers worked for 20 years digging ditches, straightening rivers, building pumps & windmills
  • By 1642 40,000 acres had been turned into farming land
  • New jobs in agriculture were created & landowners became rich
  • Draining fens = people would lose their jobs cutting rushes, & trapping waterbirds & eels = some people who lived in fens were angry (called fen tigers & they attacked & destroyed dams + pumps)