Youth, School, Entertainment, and

Diversions of the Elizabethan Period

By: Cooper Nutting and Hudson McMurry

What were the forms of popular entertainment?

● Fencing
○ Fencers trained and practiced for years in order to become skilled at this sport, and the
weapons and swords used to fight vary in many shapes, sizes, and weights. Spectators and
citizens bet on different fencers for the number of times they hit each other, or won.
● Jousting
○ a fight between mounted knights wearing armor and using lances. Jousting was a favorite
form of entertainment during the Middle Ages.
What were the forms of popular entertainment? continued.
● Archery
○ Archery was a very popular contest during this period were archers would compete for prizes and
their reputation people would bet on who they think would win this competition, the goal is to
shoot a bow and arrow at a certain range as close to the center of the target as possible.
● Gambiling/Card games
○ Gambling games in the Elizabethan era variously included tossing the bales (dice), shrove-groat,
venter point, cross-and-pile (all coin-tossing games), and wide variety of card games such as
gleek, cent, foot-savant, maw, bone-ace, monchance & primero in all its many variations.
What did people do in their free time?
● Animal fighting
○ People breed animals to fight them for money.
● Team sports
○ Tennis, wrestling, and badminton.
● Individual sports
○ Archery, golf, and hammer throwing.
● Gamble
○ Playing cards games and betting on whether you win or not.
● Plays
○ William shakespeare would write plays and perform them for people.
What was a school day like in the renaissance?
● Classes began early, around 6 in the morning and finished for lunch at 11 am. The afternoon lessons
began at 1 pm, and the day finished at 4 or 5 pm.
● The day was shortened by an hour at either end in the winter months, and pupils were usually left free
on Thursday and Saturday afternoons.
● In Elizabethan England there was no compulsory schooling. Most children's lives revolved around the
family, the church and the farm or workshop. However, Renaissance ideas spread from the continent,
including the idea that society could be improved through education and learning.
Who went to school
● Boys
○ Boys of middle or upper class went to school from age 5 to 14 once they turned 14 they were
sent of to university (college).
● Girls
○ Girls were allowed to go to school if they were nobility or upper class with the obligation that
they were literate.