New Perspectives on the Rural and Urban Poor: Great Britain 1550-1950

DOCUMENT Citation Only Michael D Nevell.

The 19th century saw the rapid urban expansion of many industrial cities, through inward migration from the surrounding countryside and overseas, and also by natural population growth. Glasgow and Manchester offer excavated examples of large areas of workers' housing with immigrant populations. This paper will look at the archaeological evidence for immigration on these sites, exploring the variety of material culture available. It will review the lack of archaeological evidence for these...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Donald B Adamson.

This paper considers the archaeology of cattle droving in mid-Sutherland and also Cowal and West LochLomondside. It focuses on the period immediately before the widespread introduction of sheep, the dispossession of many of the sub-tenants, and the application of Improvement thinking in relation to agriculture. As such, it covers the period between 1720 and 1820. It argues that cattle droving was a sign of the growing commercialisation of the Scottish Highlands, in a Gaelic society that was far...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Rowan E May.

During the 2000s, Sheffield saw a sharp increase in developer-funded excavation of 18th- and 19th-century archaeological sites. This was due to extensive re-development of the city centre and a growing recognition of the importance of industrial-period remains to Sheffield’s heritage and identity. Remains of working-class housing built in association with a rapid rise in the population from the mid-18th century formed a significant proportion of the excavated sites. This paper will consider the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Peter A. Connelly. Jayne Rimmer.

The Hungate Excavation and Research Project, a £3 million, 2 hectare developer-funded investigation carried out by York Archaeological Trust between 2006 and 2011, has provided a unique opportunity to recover and examine a geographically marginal and socially disadvantaged urban neighbourhood, uncovering nearly 2,000 years of history and archaeology of an evolving community on the fringes of urban society and intellectual enquiry.   This paper traces the social and economic development of...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Adrian Green.

This paper draws on archaeological and documentary evidence for the housing conditions of the poor in England between 1550 and 1850. Focusing on those in relative poverty and able to occupy their own homes, rather than those in abject poverty who were destitute and homeless, this paper raises the question of whether the poor lived out comparable cultural changes to the affluent. Or, did the poor occupy a distinct sub-culture in their material lives and use of space? To what extent was the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Catriona Mackie.

This paper investigates the processes of rural social reform in the Scottish Highlands during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Through a study of the Isle of Lewis, the most northerly of the Scottish Hebrides, the conflicting attitudes of tenants and those in a position of authority to tenant housing and living conditions are explored. While the desire for social reform drove landowners (and, later, local authorities) to try and improve the living conditions of the Lewis tenants,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kevin James Grant.

Poverty is relative. In the 17th century, Gaels of Scotland's Highlands and Islands inhabited a surprisingly equal society. Many Chiefs and most junior nobles in the clan system lived in dwellings little grander than that of the average Highlander, with equally few possessions. More importantly, all Gaels were inheritors of an ancient culture of aristocratic origin to which they had rights of access. Few individuals had much; but fewer had nothing. During the course of the 18th and 19th...