When we imagine English society in the Elizabethan Era (circa 1558 to 1603), we typically think of an England in the height of its Renaissance. This era of English history was one of the most economically and culturally significant periods of the Tudor Dynasty, with historians often labeling it as a golden era. Under Elizabeth’s reign, Shakespeare and Marlowe wrote their classic plays, education expanded at an unprecedented rate, and trade and industry flourished as the nation benefited greatly from the first fruits of its then-fledgling colonial projects and exploration of the New World (however horrid these projects would become to the populations they exploited, as it should go without saying). At the same time, however, more than one-third of the population lived in poverty, sanitation conditions in municipal centers were horrid as disease spread rapidly without adequate waste and refuse disposal, and the wealth gap between the aristocracy and the lower classes grew as government spending tends to focus on warfare and exploration over domestic welfare. 

While Elizabethan society, especially among the aristocrats, was a highly structured and regulated system of manners and social etiquette, there were many ways to flaunt these social conventions. Every society has rulebreakers, those who laugh in the face of law or social graces. In her 2018 book, How to Behave Badly in Elizabethan England: A Guide for Knaves, Fools, Harlots, Cuckolds, Drunkards, Liars, Thieves, and Braggarts, freelance historian and Tudor scholar Ruth Goodman takes us into the myriad ways that citizens of the kingdom could give offense, whether intentional or not, to their peers and leaders. 

Overview: 

In her work, Goodman utilizes a wide range of primary sources from the Elizabethan era (manner books, diaries, legal documents, etc) in order to show the structures of proper etiquette, and how many chose to flaunt these rules (both subtly and overtly). The chapters are divided into various categories of rude behavior, from spitting, cursing, mockery, violence, bad table etiquette, and all of the other “antisocial, irritating ways that people used to kick against the existing social mores” (3). Some of these bad behaviors are still quite obvious to us today: blowing your nose in front of people is considered impolite, we close bathroom doors when we relieve ourselves, and we are chastised for mumbling during conversations. However, many insights into the social graces of the period are unique to the Elizabethan era: we, in the West, typically don’t bend the knee or bow, and spitting on the street was considered to be healthy. 

Elizabethan England was a society in which every social interaction was dependent on the relationship between those involved with the interaction. It was an incredibly stratified society, and status and reputation were much more important to them, leading to elaborate ritual performances of social graces to those above you in social status. These performances must be done with a high level of detail, or else you could risk offending the person with whom you’re trying to curry favor. These strict social conventions demanded a high degree of accuracy in one’s body movement, and subtly missing certain cues could serve as a powerful slight. This led to a high degree of personal expression, as you could slight the other individual in a myriad of ways, each sending a distinct message of disdain to its recipient. 

The social world of the Elizabethan era hung upon these small social gestures, and learning these ever-changing conventions was a major focus of formal education. But while slighting others via an incorrectly performed curtsey, there were more obvious ways of insulting another individual, such as belching and farting in their presence. Ever-changing concepts of masculinity and femininity also drove many of the social interactions, and how one could subvert these by cutting to the core of someone’s masculine identity or subverting the “natural order” via crossdressing. While cursing at another person is an obvious sign of disdain, many slights and insults could easily be conveyed via gestures, without using a single word. 

Goodman also emphasizes the ways in which social mores shift and change over the years, or depending on one’s religious affiliation. For example, the Quakers used the phrase, “thee” and “thou” as a symbol that everyone is equal in God’s eyes. However, to the rest of the population, these words were seen as outdated and informal, which when used to address another individual, could be seen as a sign of disrespect. On the other hand, a halting style of walking, which was often utilized by the clergy with their long robes, was seen as regal and spiritually refined in the early Elizabethan era as it was adopted by the Puritans. Later, however, it was often seen as disingenuous and hypocritical, as it was soon mocked and parodied by schoolchildren and grown men alike. 

Slights such as these were also not something to take lightly in Elizabethan society. As noted earlier, reputation and honor were of the utmost importance, so any verbal slight, especially if it threatened another man’s social standing/masculinity, was often met with a vitriolic response. Duels and sword fights could break out between gentlemen, barroom brawls could erupt from a crude word or insult, and women could be accused of witchcraft for cursing their neighbor (especially the accursed’s livestock subsequently fell ill). Even simple verbal insults could land you in the courtroom, charged for libel and slander against your neighbor. Subverting the structures of power in Elizabethan society more often than not came with a hefty price, and this book is, in a way, a tribute to those who did so, despite the consequences. Goodman herself writes, “Sixteenth and seventeenth-century England was a place of vitality, experimentation, expanding horizons, and lots of small-minded, petty, badly mannered, irritating and irreverent oiks, guls, gallants, and harridans. And I love them all” (1). 

Commendations: 

First of all, Goodman is clearly well-versed and passionate about this era of history. She does a fantastic job of integrating her own personal affection for this period with a fairly balanced analysis of primary sources. Goodman’s personal anecdotes add a touch of personality and eccentricity, while her abilities as a historian are quite admirable as well. In this book, she is committed to a kind of social history that shows the day-to-day minutiae of life in Elizabethan England, analyzing history from the bottom-up. As should be obvious from the title of this tome, Goodman is not afraid to give exquisite details into the ways in which people in Elizabethan England treated one another horribly, as they fought, spit, pissed, and swore their way through life. Goodman, through her descriptions, keeps her analysis balanced, as she neither berates these individuals nor portrays them as revolutionary in their brushes against authority.

This is especially important in the role of giving a historical account. In reading historical accounts, it is far too easy to take the social conventions of the powerful at face value, not paying much attention to them, and treating them as mere affectations of a particular time period. Yet, our attention is quickly captured when we observe the gaps and inconsistencies within the social norms of those in power. Those who flaunt these social conventions reveal the real and pressing issues that haunt their everyday lives, showing us the flaws and cracks within the power structures of a given society. Indeed, Goodman herself states, 

Bad behavior can be so much more illuminating than the world of the respecting conformist, for it is those who push against the boundaries of cultural etiquette who most accurately define where the lines are drawn. It is easy to dismiss, for example, the role of bowing in the smooth running of society until you encounter the few who refused to make the gesture...Irritation and annoyance spur people into print where harmony and quiet would not. (5-7).

In this vein, Goodman’s analysis of the ways in which the badly-behaved flaunted social convention gives us a window into the past, in all of its vainglorious obsessions with reputation and social status. 

Furthermore, Goodman does well to give her social history a healthy dose of nuance. She emphasizes the role of context in the acceptability of certain behaviors. As an obvious example, burping and farting were readily acceptable in good company at a tavern, but was hardly acceptable at a formal dinner party. Goodman also notes that the standards of acceptable behavior did not stay static, but rather “shifted from good to bad and back again with disconcerting frequency” (282). The gendered nature of manners and bad behavior is also emphasized in this book, as Goodman makes clear that women were generally expected to be better behaved than the men of Elizabethan society (285).

In short, Goodman provides the reader with a wide array of interesting and delightful tidbits of bad behavior in Elizabethan England. She draws from a wide array of sources (legal proceedings, court documents, news articles, and manner books) to show how the social structure of the society hung on many commonly shared standards of behavior, both spoken and unspoken. Goodman paints a vivid (and sometimes ghastly) portrait of Elizabethan society, filling each chapter with a litany of details and interesting facts regarding language, gestures, body language, and fashion. The highly-detailed nature of Goodman’s writing, however, is also one of the book’s central downsides.

Criticism: 

This highlights one of the central critiques of the book: while Goodman attempts to balance between scholarly details and popular interest, it struggles at keeping this balance consistent. While Goodman’s work is incredibly detailed, it can often get bogged down in being overly descriptive. Several of the chapters dive far into far too much detail, such as the exact mechanics of proper bowing or the high fashion of the era. While there are images of contemporary woodcuts and illustrations, it can often be difficult to imagine some of the gestures and customs of the era. For example, the section on proper dance etiquette was exceptionally difficult to wrap my mind around. I’m sure if you have proper training in blocking, then it may be easier to understand. But imagine someone verbally telling you how to execute a proper dance move, and then replicating it without any visual reference. If you have no prior context, then it can be rather frustrating to read. Yet, at the same time, I do readily acknowledge the limitations of a textual medium in communicating these sorts of things. As a text, however, many of the descriptions of staff-fighting, foot-positioning in dueling, and various walking styles tend to be rather tedious. While she does interject some light humor into these descriptive pages, some of it can fall rather flat and it can stand out in contrast to its surrounding context. This continual vacillation between a scholarly book and a recreational read makes for a stylistically uneven tone. 

Furthermore, I was expecting a deep dive into the ways in which people in the era bucked against the social mores of the era and what it could reveal about our modern perceptions of power and reputation. Yet, the majority of each chapter rather establishes what would be considered acceptable behavior before briefly stating the ways in which people occasionally broke the rules and performed these gestures inadequately (both accidentally and purposefully). While Goodman does a phenomenal job in describing particular acts of egregious behaviors, there is much less attention devoted to the importance of such acts, and how they may have intersected with their significance in contemporary literature and politics. In contrast to the litany of curse words and examples of public defecation, in which find obvious familiar sentiments of disgust in our own society, I was much more intrigued by the unique characteristics of the era, such as the standards of cleanliness, in which donning a new pair of fresh linen clothes was utilized in the place of bathing, as linen tends to absorb sweat and deter bad body odor. While it is an incredibly well-researched work, the reader should know that it is essentially a narrow and specific micro-history of the social conventions of the Elizabethan era. Anyone wishing for a deeper analysis of the ways in which these acts were purposely used to critique systems of power is going to find themselves wanting in this volume. 

Conclusion: 

While we typically think of the Elizabethan period as a golden era in English history, Goodman reminds us that “there was no golden era when everyone lived in peace and harmony, no time when manners were perfect” (7). In short, the hyper-detailed nature of this book is both its greatest strength and its unfortunate weakness. As a scholar, I deeply appreciate the level of commitment, passion, and detail that it takes to research and convey the behaviors of a group of people that often seem so distant and detached from our present reality. Yet, to a casual reader, it might be too easy to find such details tedious and overly-elaborate. As such, for an enthusiast of the era or for those who are researching for historical-fiction novel writing purposes, then this book can serve as a fantastic resource. Yet, for the more casual reader, this can still be a great book to pick up, read a small section at a time, and marvel at the oddities and striking familiarity to be found within Elizabethan society.