The Tudors
We are going to learn more
about the food eaten in
Tudor times.
The Poor
• There were a great many poor people in
Elizabethan England.
• One reason was because of bad harvests.
Between 1594 and 1598 the harvest failed 5
times!
• This brought hunger everywhere in England
in some parts, famine.
What did they eat?
• Mostly the poor relied on bread.
• When the harvest was bad the size of the
loaves sold became smaller and smaller
and therefore it was more expensive to buy
enough to live on.
• Sometimes they would catch rabbits to eat,
hares or fish to go with their turnips,
beans and cabbage.
Terrible Tudor Greed!
Of course, the rich could afford to eat much more
than the poor.
Eating was an important part of life at court. One
feast of Henry VIII went on for seven hours!
Many dishes were for show rather than eating for
example a ‘cockerice’ would be made by sewing
the front half of a cockerel onto the back half of
a baby pig before roasting. YUCK!
Your Tudor task.
• On your table you will find an envelope.
Spread the cards out onto the table.
• Sort the cards into 2 piles.
1. Modern day food, drink and cooking
2. Tudor food, drink and cooking.
Which of the foods and tools do you think would
have been for the poor, the rich?
Plenary
Foul Facts.
• Tudor women, men and children in
England drank beer, wine, sherry, mead
and cider.
• Not because they were drunkards- because
the water was so polluted it could not be
drunk unless it was boiled!