Vagabonds

Vagrancy - Wandering the country without a settled home or job.

Who are vagabonds?

• Vagabonds were beggars, tramps and vagrants who wandered the country without a settled job.
• Some vagabonds  were soldiers who had been:
  • Demobbed
  • Or criminals
  • Unemployed
• Vagrants were people who would move into a new town or village looking for work.
• In the middle ages people had not been free to  move around form place to place.
• 1500's - restrictions had been removed and there was a lot of travel from town to town.

How were the poor helped? 

• Each village and town did try to help the genuine poor of their own parish.

• The aged, the sick and children received help to buy food, which was paid for out of the poor rate, a local tax paid for out of the poor-rate, a local tax paid by the better-off residents.

Why did people think that vagabonds were a problem?

• People felt that idleness was wrong
  • Puritan religion taught that everyone should work hard so they did not have time to be tempted to commit sins.
  • Not…