Nature of crimes: medieval and early modern
Crime in Anglo-Saxon and Medieval England
The most common crimes in Anglo-Saxon and medieval England were those driven by poverty and opportunity: petty theft of food, livestock and tools, assault, and trespass. Petty theft was the bread-and-butter offence of the medieval courts. Alongside these everyday crimes sat a range of offences that reflected the particular character of medieval society: poaching the king’s deer was a serious crime not because of the value of the deer but because it violated the authority of the lord or king over his land. Crimes against property were, in practice, often crimes against social hierarchy.
Violence was widespread and culturally tolerated to a degree that would alarm us today. Men were expected to defend their honour with force; blood feuds between families could persist for generations. The law struggled to control private violence, partly because it lacked the enforcement tools to do so. Murder — defined as secret killing without witnesses — was treated more seriously than open homicide committed in public, because the secret killing deprived the community of the ability to respond collectively.
The most common medieval crimes were petty theft (food, livestock, tools) and assault. Poaching was treated harshly because it violated the power of landlords and the crown over forest and game — a political as well as criminal offence.
Anglo-Saxon Laws and Early Justice
Anglo-Saxon law recognised wergild — a payment system by which crimes were settled through compensation rather than punishment. The amount paid depended on the victim’s social rank: killing a nobleman cost far more than killing a peasant. This system placed a monetary value on human life, explicitly linking social hierarchy to legal worth. It also meant that wealthy families could effectively buy their way out of criminal liability, a pattern that would persist in various forms for centuries.
Vagrancy and the Tudor Poor Laws
The sixteenth century saw a new crime move to the centre of public anxiety: vagrancy. The dissolution of the monasteries (1536–1541) under Henry VIII removed a major source of poor relief. Population growth, rising food prices and the enclosure of common land drove thousands off the land and into the roads. Authorities feared these roaming, unemployed people as a source of disorder and potential rebellion. Tudor legislation responded harshly: the Vagabonds Act of 1531 authorised whipping for first-time vagrants; repeat offenders could be branded, mutilated or, eventually, executed.
Heresy was one of the most politically charged crimes of the sixteenth century. Under Henry VIII and Edward VI, Catholic practices became heretical; under Mary I (1553–1558), Protestant belief was the capital offence. Some 287 Protestants were burned at the stake under Mary, earning her the name “Bloody Mary” in Protestant tradition. The Marian persecution targeted ordinary people as much as prominent reformers, demonstrating that heresy prosecution could serve as a tool of political terror.
Treason was redefined dramatically under Henry VIII. The Treason Act of 1534 made it treasonous to deny the royal supremacy in words — not just in deeds. This allowed the crown to use treason charges against critics, intellectuals and even private citizens who questioned royal policy. Sir Thomas More was executed for treason in 1535 for refusing to swear the Oath of Supremacy. The broadening of treason law reflected the Tudor state’s anxiety about its own legitimacy.
Witch Trials in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries
The Witchcraft Act of 1563, passed under Elizabeth I, brought witchcraft under secular criminal law and imposed the death penalty where the victim died. It built on Henry VIII’s 1542 Act, which had first made witchcraft capital but was repealed in 1547; the 1563 Act did not make all witchcraft a capital offence. The new law reflected anxieties about popular superstition, religious instability and social disorder. Witch trials tended to target the poor and marginal, especially elderly women who had become social liabilities. Accusations often arose from local disputes, illness or misfortune — a neighbour’s cow dying after a quarrel could trigger a witch accusation.
The most intense witch panic in English history occurred in East Anglia during the 1640s, when Matthew Hopkins operated as self-styled Witchfinder General. Hopkins exploited the chaos of the English Civil War — the collapse of normal judicial oversight, social anxiety and religious extremism — to extract confessions through sleep deprivation and other coercive methods. Historians estimate that Hopkins was responsible for the execution of over 100 people, perhaps more, between 1644 and 1647. His activities were extraordinary even by the standards of the time and ended when sceptical judges began to challenge his methods.
The Witchcraft Act was passed in 1563. Matthew Hopkins operated as Witchfinder General in East Anglia during the 1640s, exploiting the disorder of the Civil War. He was responsible for the prosecution and execution of over 100 suspected witches, making his campaign the most deadly witch panic in English history.
The nature of crime did change between the medieval and early modern periods, but there were also important continuities. Petty theft remained the single most common offence throughout — the forms changed but the poverty that drove it did not. What genuinely changed was the addition of new categories of crime linked to political and religious upheaval: heresy, treason and witchcraft were largely products of the Reformation era. Vagrancy law also represented a new form of criminalisation — making poverty itself an offence — that had no direct medieval equivalent.