Beggars badges

Beggars' badges were badges and other identifying insignia worn by beggars beginning in the early fifteenth century in Great Britain and Ireland. They served two purposes; to identify individual beggars, and to allow beggars to move freely from place to place.

It was not until the introduction of poor laws across the nations of Great Britain and Ireland that the “problem” of the poor was properly addressed. In England and Scotland, from the time of the old poor laws in Elizabethan times, some form of safety net was provided for the destitute. The Victorian poor laws set in place the basis for modern social care. In addition to unclassified poor, there were bedesmen. Bedesmen were elderly men and in some cases women, who were cared for by the Church or civic authorities. Bedesmen were housed in hospitals from the early twelfth century. Cowan and Easson provide the most comprehensive account of medieval hospitals. Many such hospitals were chanteries with bedesmen.

However, many poor were left to fend for themselves in towns and villages across the whole country. Such an un-regulated situation caused many local problems. The earliest known reference to beggars badges is quoted in Balfour Paul's survey of badges, published in the nineteenth century. He claims that there was a regulation in Valencia, Spain that required poor men to wear a leaden badge stamped with the arms of Valencia. In Britain, from as early as the fifteenth century, badges were introduced to identify beggars. Badges served two purposes; first they enabled civic and church authorities to control those who were allowed to ask for alms. For example, in 1425, an act of the Scottish Parliament declared:

... Alsua it is ordanyt that na thigar be thollyt to thyg nor bege nothir in burghe nor to lande betuix xiiij and iij score [and ten] of yheris of age bot thai be seyne be the consall of the toune or of the cuntre at thai may nocht vyne thar leyffing othir vays. And thai that sa beis fundin sall have a takin to land of the schera and in bwrowis off the aldirmen and baylyheis, and that undir the payn of birnynge on the cheyk and bannyssing of the cuntre ...

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