10.1.1

Life in Britain 1750

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Life in Britain in 1750

A wave of new inventions in the latter half of the 1700s allowed Britain to begin producing cotton on a huge scale and export this abroad for hefty profits.

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Rural society

  • Around 1750, Britain was still a very rural, agricultural society. - Over 80% of the population lived in the countryside, mainly working on the land, rearing animals and growing crops.
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Cottage industry

  • If people did work in industry, these were cottage industries run from within their own home.
    • For example, people might knit or weave in their home, but they would only be able to produce a small amount, enough to earn a living.
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Transport

  • It took a long time to travel around the country.
  • There were no trains, so travelling over a long distance had to be done on horseback, or using a horse and cart.
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Urbanisation

  • But between around 1750 and 1840, Britain was transformed from a rural nation based around agriculture to an industrialised, urban nation which depended on factories and machines.
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The Industrial Revolution

  • Before the Industrial Revolution, all products had to be made by hand, which was time-consuming and could be exhausting.
  • But from around the mid-1750s, there was a wave of inventions which gradually made it possible for more and more work to be done by machines. This was much quicker and cheaper.

Jump to other topics

1The Medieval World: 450-1450 AD

1.1Anglo-Saxon England

1.2The Contest for the English Throne

1.3Conquering the Holy Land, 10-96-1396 AD

1.4King John

1.5The Magna Carta & Parliament

1.6The Black Death

2Worldviews

3The Empire of Mali

4The Renaissance & Reformations, 1500-1598 AD

5The British Empire, 1583-1960 AD

6The Peasants' Revolt

7Religion in the Middle Ages

8Slavery, 1619-1833 AD

9The English Civil War, 1642-1660

10The Industrial Revolution, 1750-1840

11US Independence, 1775-1783

12The French Revolution, 1789-1815

13The British Empire, 1857–1930

14Suffrage

15World War 1, 1914-1918

16The Inter-War Years, 1919-1939

17World War 2, 1939-1945

18The Cold War, 1947-1962

19Civil Rights in the USA, 1954-1975

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