19th Century England Social Hierarchy

Social hierarchy is classification of society of a nation that segregates the residents of a country into certain groups based on various factors out of which the wealth and occupation play a significant role in this segregation.

A huge number of people are normally accrued in a society but all those people do not have the same job for their living or same status in the society. So there are mixtures of factors, depending on which the basic social structure of a society is divided into different classes in diverse ways.

These factors incorporate division on the basis of power, education, economic status, prestige etc. The same was the thing with the 19^th century England social hierarchy. The 19^th century England was divided in several classes and those classes were further sub-divided accordingly. The 19^th century England social hierarchy is described below in a descending order pattern describing all the classes in brief.

Aristocrats

The highest power, authority and social status holder of the 19^th century England social hierarchy were the aristocrats. These people usually were not involved in any manual work since their time was so valuable to do such work that were non artistic and could be completed by normal people. These Aristocrats include following profiles:

• The Royal Family
• Spiritual Lords
• Temporal Lords
• Great Officers of the State
  • Baronets
  • Knights
  • Country Gentlemen

Middle Class

The middle class of the 19^th century England social hierarchy included people who were quite wealthier than the lower class. As a social class, this ‘middling class’ usually referred to a wide band of the England population. This class further got divided into two parts depending on the social status and economical power. These two categories are as follows –

• Upper Middle Class– These were the people at administrative levels enjoying high authority and high social status in the society. The following profiles were included in this category:
  • Factory Owners
  • Large Scale Business Men
  • Bankers
  • Doctors
  • Lawyers
  • Engineers
  • Clergymen
• Lower Middle Class– These people were a step lower to the upper middle class people group.
  • Small Scale Business Men
  • Shopkeepers
  • Merchants
  • Civil Servants

Lower Class

This was the lowest social class in the 19^th century England social hierarchy. This class was further sub categorized into two parts. These were as follows:

• The Working Class– This was the upper lower class in the hierarchy. These were men, women and children who used to do the lowest level work for the country. This included following profiles:
  • Labor
  • Factory Workers
  • Seamstresses
  • Miners
  • Sweepers
• The Poor – These were the people living on the charity. They were not involved in any work.

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