The family the Tudor seized the crown of England in 1845, some of the Henry’s you might recognize is Henry V (Shakespeare), Henry V111 (and his 6 wifes) and Elizabeth I and the present Queen Elizabeth II. In the mid 1850’s what was life for the average person living in England? While most of us focus on the Kings and their friends or the 1% of the day; authour Ruth Goodman wrote a book called How to be a Tudor – a Dawn to Dusk guide to everyday life published by Penguin Books, London, UK, 2015. The book is outlined under the typical themes of the people who were not royalty, but were the bulk of the population – the small shop owners, the guilds and serfs. It must be remembered similar to America before World War II, most of the country was living in the rural area or were farmers. Life revolved around looking after the animals and crops.

In one of the chapters, the author writes for most people 80% of their pay went to rent and food. This leads 20% to everything else. One method to verify this statement is what did people leave to their families in wills? One item was clothing since it was expensive. Cloth at that time, prior to the industrial revolution which among other things brought the price of clothing down drastically. In the author’s research since clothes were expensive, what clothes a person wore could show their status symbol. This worked in two ways – wearing expensive clothes, people thought you had a lot of money to spend at their establishments (service was better) as well those that tried to con people from their money targeted those that dressed well. In a society where the vast majority of people displayed their status and wealth, a sut of clothes was taken at face value. In 1552 – a book called A Manifest Detection of the Most Vyle and Detestable Use of Diceplay was published anoymously as a warning to young men about the dishonesty and tricks of London’s criminal fraternity. The book discusses confidence games, loaded dice and card sharps. It seems trying to take money from people continues throughout the ages.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, in everyday life living in Tudor time, the average person was missing savings. Savings allows investments which decisions are made to become wealthier sooner or later. While the appeal of sooner is one that never will go away, over the long term the slow but steady growth from dividends and investing in profitable stocks does not change. Learn from the past, but enjoy the present and you will stay curious.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.