Authorities ranging from philosophers to politicians nowadays question the existence of concepts of society, whether in the present or the past. This book argues that social concepts most definitely existed in late medieval and early modern England, laying the foundations for modern models of society. The book analyzes social paradigms and how they changed in the period. A pervasive medieval model was the "body social," which imagined a society of three estates - the clergy, the nobility, and the commonalty - conjoined by interdependent functions, arranged in static hierarchies based upon...

This pamphlet examines recent research into the poor laws of Tudor and Stuart England. Dr Beier asks the question 'who were the poor?' and in answering it places the 'problem of the poor' in its historical context, examining it in relation to medieval provisions for dealing with poverty. He shows how far legislation was influenced by economic changes, by ideas about poverty and by the interests of the legislators themselves. Dr Beier evaluates the varying interpretations of the poor laws, from those who have seen them as an early 'welfare state' to those who have considered them to be the...