The Working Life of Women in the Seventeenth Century

Alice Clark

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781136233951
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: History

First published in 1968. This investigation was undertaken with a view to discovering the actual circumstances of women's lives in the Seventeenth Century. The Seventeenth Century itself forms a sort of watershed between two very widely differing eras in the history of Englishwomen— the Elizabethan and the Eighteenth Century. It demonstrates the conditions under which the obscure mass of women live and fulfil their duties as human beings and focuses on one aspect of their lives, namely the place of women in the economic organisation of society.

CHAPTER V.

CRAFTS AND TRADES.

(A) Crafts. Influence of Gilds—Inclusion of women—Position of craftsman’s wife—Purposes of Gilds—The share of women in religious, social and trading privileges—Admission chiefly by marriage—Stationer’s Company—Carpenter’s Company—Rules of other Gilds and Companies—Apprenticeship to women—Exclusion of women did not originate in sex jealousy—Position of women in open trades—Women’s trades.

(B) Retail Trades. Want of technical training inclined women towards retailing—Impediments in their way—Apprenticeship of girls to shopkeepers—Prosecution of unauthorised traders—Street and market trading—Pedlars, Regraters, Badgers—Opposition of shopkeepers.

(C) Provision Trades.

1. Bakers. Never specially a woman’s trade—Widows—Share of married women.

2. Millers. Occasionally followed by women.

3. Butchers. Carried on by women as widows and by married women—also independently—Regrating.

4. Fishwives. Generally very poor.

5. Brewers. Originally a special women’s trade—Use of feminine form Brewster—Creation of monopoly—Exclusion of women by the trade when capitalised—retailing still largely in hands of women.

6. Vintners.

AGRICULTURE and the textile industries having been considered separately, owing to their importance and the very special conditions obtaining in both, the other forms of industry in which women were employed may be roughly divided into three classes, according to certain influences which made them more or less suitable for women’s employment.—(a) Skilled Trades. (b) Retail Trades. (c) Provision Trades.

(a) The Skilled Trades. Most characteristic of the skilled trades are those crafts which became more or less highly organised and specialised by means of Gilds ; though girls were seldom apprenticed to the gild trades, yet her marriage to a member of the Gild conferred upon a woman her husband’s rights and privileges ; and as she retained these after his death, she could, as a widow, continue to control and direct the business which she inherited from her husband. In many trades the gild organisation broke down, and though the form of apprenticeship was retained its observance secured few, if any, privileges. Some skilled trades were chiefly if not wholly, in the hands of women, and these appear never to have been organised, though long apprenticeships were served by the girls who entered them.

(b) The Retail Trades. The classification of retail trades as a group distinct from the Skilled Trades and the Provision Trades is somewhat arbitrary, because under the system of Family Industry, the maker of the goods was often his own salesman, or the middlemen who sold the goods to the consumers were themselves organised into gilds. Nevertheless, from the woman’s point of view retailing deserves separate consideration, because, whether as a branch of Family Industry or as a trade in itself, the employment of selling was so singularly adapted to the circumstances of women, that among their resources it may almost take rank with agriculture and spinning.

(c) The Provision Trades also, whether concerned with the production or only with the sale of Provisions, occupy a special position, because the provisioning of their households has been regarded from time immemorial as one of the elementary duties falling to the share of women, and it is interesting to note how far skill acquired by women in such domestic work was useful to them in trade.

In all three classes of industry women were employed as their husbands’ assistants or partners, but in the middle ages married women also engaged in business frequently on their own account. This was so usual that almost all the early Customs of the Boroughs enable a woman, when so trading, to go to law as though though she were a femme sole, and provide that her husband shall not be responsible for her debts. For example, the Customs of the City of London declare that : “Where a woman coverte de baron follows any craft within the said city by herself apart, with which the husband in no way intermeddles, such woman shall be bound as a single woman in all that concerns her said craft. And if the wife shall plead as a single woman in a Court of Record, she shall have her law and other advantages by way of plea just as a single woman. And if she is condemned she shall be committed to prison until she shall have made satisfaction ; and neither the husband nor his goods shall in such case be charged or interfered with. If a wife, as though a single woman, rents any house or shop within the said city, she shall be bound to pay the rent of the said house or shop, and shall be impleaded and sued as a single woman, by way of debt if necessary, notwithstanding that she was coverte de baron, at the time of such letting, supposing that the lessor did not know there-of. … Where plaint of debt is made against the husband, and the plaintiff declares that the husband made the contract with the plaintiff by the hand of the wife of such defendant, in such case the said defendant shall have the aid of his wife, and shall have a day until the next Court, for taking counsel with his wife.”¹

The Customal of the Town and Port of Sandwich provides that “if a woman who deals publickly in fish, fruit, cloth or the like, be sued to the amount of goods delivered to her, she ought to answer either with or without her husband, as the plaintiff pleases. But in every personal plea of trespass, she can neither recover nor plead against any body, without her husband. If she be not a public dealer, she cannot answer, being a covert baron.”² Similarly at Rye, “if any woman that is covert baron be impleaded in plea of debt, covenant broken, or chattels withheld, and she be known for sole merchant, she ought to answer without the presence of her baron.”¹

In Carlisle it was said that “where a wife that haith a husband use any craft wi^thin this citie or the liberties of the same besides her husband crafte or occupation and that he mel not w^th her sayd craft this wife shalbe charged as woman sole. And if the husband and the wife be impledit in such case the wife shall plead as woman sole. And if she be condempned she shall goe to ward unto she haue mayd agrement. And the husband nor his guds shal not in this case be charged. And if the woman refuse to appeare and answere the husband or servand to bryng her in to answer.”²

Though examples of the separate trading of women occur frequently in the seventeenth century, no doubt the more usual course was for her to assist her husband in his business. When this was transacted at home her knowledge of it was so intimate that she could successfully carry on the management during her husband’s absence. How complete was the reliance which men placed upon their wives under these circumstances is illustrated by the story of John Adams, a Quaker from Yorkshire, who took a long journey “in the service of Truth” to Holland and Germany. He describes how a fearful being visited him by night in a vision, telling him that he had been deceived, and not for the first time, in undertaking this service, and that all was in confusion at home. “The main reason why things are so is, thy wife, that used to be at the helm in thy business, is dead.” Thoroughly alarmed, he was preparing to hurry home when a letter arrived, saying that all was well, “whereby I was relieved in mind, and confirmed I was in my place, and that it was Satan, by his transformation, who had deceived and disturbed me.”¹

The understanding and good sense which enabled women to assume control during the temporary absence of their husbands, fitted them also to bear the burden alone when widowed. Her capacity was so much taken for granted that public opinion regarded the wife as being virtually her husband’s partner, leases or indentures were made out in their joint names, and on the husband’s death the wife was left in undisturbed possession of the stock, apprentices and goodwill of the business.

A. Skilled Trades or Crafts.

The origin of the Craft Gilds is obscure. They were preceded by Religious Gilds in which men and women who were associated in certain trades united for religious and social purposes. Whether these Religious Gilds...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title
• Copyright
• Preface
• Contents
• I. Introductory
• II. Capitalists
• III. Agriculture
• IV. Textiles
• V. Crafts and Trades
• VI. Professions
• VII. Conclusion
• List of Authorities
• List of Wages Assessments
• Index