Hostname: page-component-5db58dd55d-jnbmb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-06-01T08:34:17.872Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Poverty or Prosperity?The Economic Fortunes of Ministers in Post-Reformation Fife, 1560–1640

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2011

JOHN McCALLUM
Affiliation:
School of History, University of St Andrews, KY16 9AR; e-mail: jdmccallum0@hotmail.com

Abstract

One of the many areas in which there is a lack of knowledge of the post-Reformation Scottish clergy is their economic status. This article uses the county of Fife as a case study to examine the finances of post-Reformation ministers. Stipends improved gradually during the decades after the Reformation, especially for ministers paid in kind, but there were still serious problems in many parishes well into the seventeenth century. Ministers' testaments show few signs of real poverty, however, and it appears that most ministers lived modestly and within their means, rather than acting as major economic actors in the parish.

Information

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable