

First Estate: Clergy



Ownership of land (especially in Catholic countries)
Tax exempt in most cases
Composed of members from all social classes
Second Estate: Nobility




Aristocrats (1-5% of the population)

Hereditary titles on nobility
The most wealthy portion of society
Often paid few taxes
Land ownership (land = wealth)


Third Estate: Commoners

Peasants compose the largest group

Agricultural workers

Tenant farming very common

Townspeople

Urbanization: growth of towns and cities

Industrial revolution gave rise to a new social class of urban workers (more on this in Industrial Revolution unit)

Shopkeepers, artisans, etc.


Third Estate:

Middle-Class also part of Third Estate

Non-nobles

Often have some degree of wealth

Often businessmen or merchants

“middling sort” or “bourgeoisie”

Third Estate often carried the tax burden


Western Europe

Nuclear family becomes the norm

People waited until later in 20’s to marry and establish independent households

Average age of first marriage was 27

Family sizes 5-6 members

Wealthy families often larger


Eastern Europe

Marriage before reaching 20’s

Large, extended, multigenerational families

Serfdom still practiced, which kept people tied to land for agricultural labor

Early marriage and large families=more labor






Girls often taught homemaking skills
Some girls worked as servants in wealthy homes
Dowries common: woman’s family pays husband when marriage takes place
Wives of businessmen would often work in the family business
Many professions did not allow women to participate

Those that did would pay lower wages


High infant mortality rates

20% die within first year of life

Wet nurses among the aristocracy

Little emphasis on child-rearing

In cases where families could not afford to care for a child, infanticide may have been practiced and some babies were abandoned

Foundling Hospitals and orphanages created




Literacy gradually increasing

Renaissance, Reformation, and Enlightenment helped encourage literacy
Formal education was typically restricted largely to the wealthy
Compulsory education was introduced in German states first


Prussia in 1717
By late-1700’s, most other states had created rules for universal education


Travel became trendy

Literature attracted people to foreign places

Elites would visit major cities

London, Paris, Rome, etc.

Became known as the “Grand Tour”

Cities improved lighting, public facilities and transportation systems in an effort to encourage tourism


Culture and learning was spread through various means during the 1700’s

Salons: gatherings in the homes of wealthy women

Masonic Lodges: Freemasons gathered in support of reason, progress, and toleration; often distrusted because of their secretive nature

Academies of Learning and Science were created to promote interest in science


Rococo (see ppt)

Famous composers

Johann Sebastian Bach

George Frederick Handel

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart




Novels became popular

Themes of family life, love, marriage were common
Daniel Defoe Robinson Crusoe, Moll Flanders
Romanticism developed toward the end of the 1700’s

Celebrates emotion rather than logic, the power of mother nature, and inner passion


William Wordsworth, famous poet associated with Romanticism
Johann von Goethe

Sturm and Drang (Storm and Stress)

Faust, the story of a man who makes a pact with the devil in order to acquire all the knowledge of the world


Formal religion was often criticized during the
Enlightenment. Christianity did experience a revival with the development of Methodism and Quakerism


Methodism:

Founder: John Wesley


Very popular among lower classes
A “grass roots” approach to religion
Quakers:




Society of Friends
Encouraged personal religious experiences, lack of ceremony or formality
Became known for their spontaneous worship, even allowing women to lead services
Also known for their pacifist beliefs (opposed war)


Originally a vital element of the Catholic
Counter Reformation, the Society of Jesus
(Jesuits) eventually fell with disfavor among monarchs in Europe

Eventually, their activities were suppressed and
Jesuits lost their place in Catholic society





Jews were the most mistreated religious group in
Europe

Anti-Semitism common throughout European history
Eastern Europe had largest concentration of Jewish communities

Most Western European nations had expelled Jews during the
Middle Ages
Enlightenment led to better treatment for Jews in some countries, but not in much of Eastern Europe
Pogroms (attacks on Jewish communities) became increasingly common, especially as nationalism began to grow in the 1800’s.