The Charities of London 14801660
In this work Professor Jordan continues his study of the origins of modern social and cultural institutions in England. He is concerned with the momentous shift which occurred in mens aspirations for their society in the course of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as reflected in the charities which were established by gifts and bequests.
This volume deals with the immense contribution made by London to this process of historical change, a change so swift as to be revolutionary in its institutional implications. The author describes the vast charitable system which London created, examines at length the aspirations and the social philosophy of the merchant aristocracy which controlled its affairs, and seeks to assess the social dominance exerted by London in this era as the flood of its charitable generosity poured out across the face of the realm. It is Professor Jordans estimate that more than a third of the whole of the great charitable endowments created in England during this period were Londons gift, while almost a third of Londans benefactions were made for the benefit of communities in other parts of the realm. It is not too much to say that Londons almost prodigal generosity was fashioning for all of England the institutions of new age.
Here is recorded the annual of a proud achievement by a city which discovered its own greatness in the period under discussion. Is is not fair to say that few authors have quite so fully mastered the rich and variegated life and aspirations of the city as has Professor Jordan. Certainly none have recounted the triumph of its achievement with greater understanding and pride.
This book was first published in 1960.
First published in 1960 by Routledge
This edition published 2006 by Routledge
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2006 W.K. Jordan
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ISBN 10: 0-415-40193-3 (set)
ISBN 10: 0-415-40194-1 (volume I)
ISBN 10: 0-415-40195-X (volume II)
ISBN 13: 978-0-415-40193-7 (set)
ISBN 13: 978-0-415-40194-4 (volume I)
ISBN 13: 978-0-415-40195-1 (volume II)
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The Charities of London 1480-1660
by the same author
The Development of Religious Toleration in England
I From the beginning of the English Reformation to the death of Queen Elizabeth I
2 From the Accession of James I to the Convention of the Long Parliament , 1603-1640
3 From the Convention of the Long Parliament to the Reformation, 1640-1660
4 Attainment of the Theory and Accommodations in Thought and Institutions, 1640-1660
PHILANTHROPY IN ENGLAND I48O-I66O
The Charities of London 1480-1660
THE ASPIRATIONS AND THE ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE URBAN SOCIETY
BY
W. K. JORDAN
Professor of History, Harvard University
First Published in 1960
This book is copyright under the Berne Convention. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act 1956, no portion may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Enquiries should be addressed to the publisher.
in I0 on II point Plantin type
BY HAZELL WATSON AND VINEY LTD
AYLESBURY AND SLOUGH
The first volume of this work, published in 1959, under the title Philanthropy in England, 1480-1660, was an essay commenting on evidence drawn from ten English counties which together comprised something like a third of the land mass of the realm, about a third of the population of the nation in 1600, and perhaps half of the wealth of England in the age with which we are concerned. An effort was made to assess the social problems of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and to describe the nature of the problem of poverty in this era and the heroic measures which men took to deal with its control, if not its cure. Though remedial legislation was adopted, it was our conclusion that men of the age reposed their principal confidence in private charity, gathered by the instrumentality of the charitable trust into large and disciplined aggregates of wealth with which formidably effective social institutions could be founded and endowed, as they undertook to relieve widespread and degrading poverty and to secure its prevention by a vast enlargement of the ambit of social and economic opportunity.
We have seen that the philanthropic impulse was derived from many sources during our period and that it evoked a steadily and rapidly mounting charitable response which reached a great climax of giving in the first generation of the seventeenth century when, it is not too much to say, the basic institutions of the modern society were securely established. Men's aspirations underwent a notable metamorphosis in the century following the English Reformation, an almost complete absorption with secular needs and a stalwart concern for the visible needs of the society marking this transformation. All regions and all classes yielded, rapidly or reluctantly as the case might be, to these powerful forces of change and to the resolution to build a better, a more comfortable, and a more civilized society for mankind.
England remained throughout the course of our long period a predominantly rural society in which there were not more than a score of large market towns, three or possibly four provincial cities which exhibited truly urban characteristics, and one great city, London, which in terms of its size, its wealth, and its corporate confidence was an urban colossus fixed in what can only be described as a rural setting on a national scale. It is with the urban mind, the urban social conscience, and with the precocity and power of urban aspirations that we are concerned in this volume. And this really means London. Elsewhere, we shall deal with the contributions of Bristol, the second city in the realm, and we shall in the course of our study of ten of the English counties examine the charities and the social aspirations of all the other principal urban communities in the realm, but it remains true that London stood quite alone in England as a great urban monadnock. We shall seek to comment on the great charitable contributions which London made, to describe at some length the aspirations and the social philosophy of the merchant aristocracy which controlled its affairs, and to measure the immense social dominance gained by London in this era as the flood of its charitable generosity poured out across the face of the whole realm.