Elizabethan England From 'A Description of England,' by William Harrison

There have been heretofore, and at sundry times, divers famous universities in this island, and those even in my days not altogether forgotten, as one at Bangor, erected by Luci...

There are now two provinces only in England, of which the first and greatest is subject to the see of Canterbury, comprehending a part of Lhoegres,[100] whole Cambria, and also...

The situation of our region, lying near unto the north, doth cause the heat of our stomachs to be of somewhat greater force: therefore our bodies do crave a little more ample no...

We, in England, divide our people commonly into four sorts, as gentlemen, citizens or burgesses, yeomen, and artificers or labourers. Of gentlemen the first and chief (next the...

The air (for the most part) throughout the island is such as by reason in manner of continual clouds is reputed to be gross, and nothing so pleasant as that of the main. Howbeit...

There is no kind of tame cattle usually to be seen in these parts of the world whereof we have not some, and that great store, in England, as horses, oxen, sheep, goats, swine,...

It is none of the least blessings wherewith God hath endued this island that it is void of noisome beasts, as lions, bears, tigers, pardes, wolves, and such like, by means where...

It should seem by ancient records, and the testimony of sundry authors, that the whole countries of Lhoegres and Cambria, now England and Wales, have sometimes been very well re...

The greatest part of our building in the cities and good towns of England consisteth only of timber, for as yet few of the houses of the communalty (except here and there in the...

In cases of felony, manslaughter, robbery, murder, rape, piracy, and such capital crimes as are not reputed for treason or hurt of the estate, our sentence pronounced upon the o...

In every shire of England there are great plenty of parks, whereof some here and there, to wit, well near to the number of two hundred, for her daily provision of that flesh, ap...

I am unwilling to send out this _Harrison_, the friend of some twenty years' standing, without a few words of introduction to those readers who don't know it. The book is full o...

After such time as Calais was won from the French, and that our countrymen had learned to trade into divers countries (whereby they grew rich), they began to wax idle also, and...

There are (as I take it) few great towns in England that have not their weekly markets, one or more granted from the prince, in which all manner of provision for household is to...

folk already referrd to (p. xiii. above); and though it's not so bitter as Stubbes's or Crowley's, yet it's fun, with its "dog in a doublet," and its beard bit, if a man "be wes...

This section[51] is longer than I meant it to be; and it doesn't bring out the religious side of Harrison's character. But I hope it leaves the reader with a kindly impression o...

Order requireth that I speak somewhat of the fowls also of England, which I may easily divide into the wild and tame; but, alas! such is my small skill in fowls that, to say the...

With how great benefits this island of ours hath been endued from the beginning I hope there is no godly man but will readily confess, and yield unto the Lord God his due honour...

The first sort therefore he divideth either into such as rouse the beast, and continue the chase, or springeth the bird, and bewrayeth her flight by pursuit. And as these are co...

It lieth not in me to set down exactly the number and names of the palaces belonging to the prince, nor to make any description of her grace's court, sith my calling is, and hat...

That Samothes (or Dis) gave the first laws to the Celts (whose kingdom he erected about the fifteenth of Nimbrote), the testimony of Berosus is proof sufficient. For he not only...

_writs_ or _briefs_, whereof there are some original and some judicial. The parties _plaintiff_ and _defendant_, when they appear, proceed (if the case do so require) by _plaint...

How well or how strongly our country hath been furnished in times past with armour and artillery it lieth not in me as of myself to make rehearsal. Yet that it lacketh both in t...

There is no commonwealth at this day in Europe wherein there is not great store of poor people, and those necessarily to be relieved by the wealthier sort, which otherwise would...

There is nothing that hath brought me into more admiration of the power and force of antiquity than their diligence and care had of their navies: wherein, whether I consider the...

As in old time we read that there were eight-and-twenty flamines and archflamines in the south part of this isle, and so many great cities under their jurisdiction, so in these...

Quarries with us are pits or mines, out of which we dig our stone to build withal, and of these as we have great plenty in England so are they of divers sorts, and those very pr...

I have in my description of waters, as occasion hath served, treated of the names of some of the several fishes which are commonly to be found in our rivers. Nevertheless, as ev...

An Englishman, endeavouring sometime to write of our attire, made sundry platforms for his purpose, supposing by some of them to find out one steadfast ground whereon to build t...