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Poverty During The Victorian Era

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The Victorian Era was a time of wide extremes. elegant city streets, gas lamps, and in contrast grinding poverty. It was also a time of exploration and invention. With their pioneer spirit wild frontier towns were born across the world. and with their flare and ingenuity the Victorians took with them their values and elegance. (Matthew Arnold) Though Victorian period was influenced by the reform act 1832 and subsequent acts, yet this period also marked by extreme diversities with the industrial reforms, cultural progress, scientific advancement on one hand and poverty and wars on the other.
The Victorian era identified four classes as a part and parcel of their social structure; the Nobility and Gentry, Middle Class, Upper Working Class and Lower Working Class. People in the respective categories were expected to remain within their class and any slight change from one class to another was considered to be a serious offence. In all these categories, the role of the women remained unchanged. They were supposed to live a highly restrictive life with their life centered around their husband and subsequently their children.
During the nineteenth century the men and women roles became more intense than …show more content…

But being a poor Victorian wife, you had no individual rights under the law. Until passing of the 1870 and 1883 Married Women’s Property Acts, These acts gave the right to own property to all married women. At the end of the 18th century, the average age of first marriage was 28 years old for men and 26 years old for women. During the 19th century, the average age fell for English women, but it didn’t drop any lower than 22. Patterns varied depending on social and economic class, of course, with working-class women tending to marry slightly older than their aristocratic counterparts. But the prevailing modern idea that all English ladies wed before leaving their teenage years is well off the mark. (British

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