'Beggars, Miserable, Destitute and Poor'. The Archaeology of Urban Poverty in Early Modern Denmark

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Poverty And Plenty In The North", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The 16th and 17th century saw a growth in the urban poor, many of whom were parts of a mass migration from countryside to cities. Many of the newcomers were poor trying to escape a poverty induced by epidemics, wars, climate change or political unrest. Some managed to settle in the cities for life, while others faced a life in constant migration. Among the newcomers in the cities were sailors, soldiers and servants. These groups are difficult to document in most documentary and archaeological sources; however, recent research hsa shown that the groups were often marginilazed by the urban communities they met after migration. The aim of this paper is to address the resilience and survival strategies of these forgotten poor migrants in the early modern cities. In the paper, a case study from an archaeological investigation will be presented.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Poverty And Plenty In The North   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2023

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow