The physicians turned surgery over to the surgeons, who received a charter in 1605 by which barbers were excluded from all surgical work except bloodletting and the drawing of teeth. Surgeons dealt with skin disease, ulcers, hernia, bladder stones, and broken bones, which they had some skill in setting. They performed amputations, which were without antiseptics or anesthesia. Internal operations usually resulted in death. Caesarian section was attempted, but did not save the life of the mother. Apprenticeship was the route to becoming a surgeon. A College of Surgeons was founded. Students learned anatomy, for which they received the corpses of four executed felons a year.
The apothecaries and grocers received a charter in 1607, but in 1618, the apothecaries were given the sole right to purchase and sell potions, and to search the shops of grocers and stop the sale by them of any potions. In London, the apothecaries were looked over by the College of Physicians to see that they were not selling evil potions or poisons. In 1618 was the first pharmacy book.
There were three hospitals in London, two for the poor, and Bedlam [Bethlehem] Hospital for the insane. Others were treated at home or in the physician's home.
Theaters were shut down in times of plague to prevent spread of disease there. Towndwellers who could afford it left to live in the country.
Shakespeare wrote most of his plays in this period. Most popular reading was still Bibles, prayer books, psalm books, and devotional works. Also popular were almanacs, which started with a single sheet of paper. An almanac usually had a calendar; information on fairs, roads, and posts; farming hints; popularized scientific knowledge; historical information; sensational news; astrological predictions; and later, social, political, and religious comment. Many households had an almanac. Books tried to reconcile religion and science as well as religion and passion or sensuality. Walter Ralegh's "History of the World", written while he was in prison, was popular. Ben Johnson wrote poetry and satiric comedies. Gentlemen read books of manners such as James Cleland's "Institution of a Young Noble Man" (1607). In 1622, the first regular weekly newspaper was started.
Although there was a large advance in the quality of boys' education and in literacy, the great majority of the people were unable to read fluently. Since writing was taught after one could read fluently, literacy was indicated by the ability to sign one's name. Almost all gentlemen and professional men were literate. About half the yeomen and tradesmen and craftsmen were. Only about 15% of husbandmen, laborers, servants, and women were literate.
The Elizabethan love of madrigal playing gradually gave way to a taste for instrumental music, including organs and flutes. The violin was introduced and popular with all classes. Ballads were sung, such as "Barbary Allen", about a young man who died for love of her, after which she died of sorrow. When they were buried next to each other, a rose from his grave grew around a briar from her grave. The ballad "Geordie" relates a story of a man hanged for stealing and selling sixteen of the king's royal deer. The ballad "Matty Groves" is about a great Lord's fair young bride seducing a lad, who was then killed by the Lord. In the ballad "Henry Martin", the youngest man of three brothers is chosen by lot to turn pirate to support his brothers. When his pirate ship tries to take a merchant ship, there is sea fight in which the merchant ship sinks and her men drown. The ballad "The Trees They Do Grow High" tells of an arranged marriage between a 24 year old woman and the 14 year old son of a great lord. She tied blue ribbons on his head when he went to college to let the maidens know that he was married. But he died at age 16, after having sired a son.
May Day was a holiday with dancing around a Maypole and people dressed up as characters such as Queen of the May, Robin Hood, Little John, Friar Tuck, Maid Marion, the fool, and the piper. New Year's Day was changed to January 1st.
Golf was played in Scotland, and James introduced it into
England. James I was the last monarch to engage in falconry.
Francis Bacon wrote the "Advancement of Learning" and "Novum Organum" (New Learning) in which he encouraged the use of the inductive method to find out scientific truths and also truths in general, that is reasoning from a sample to the whole. According to him, the only way to arrive at the truth was to observe and determine the correlations of facts. He advocated a process of elimination of hypothesized ideas. First, experiments were made, then general conclusions were drawn from them, and then these generalizations were tested in further experiments. His "New Learning" showed the way out of the scholastic method and reverence for dogma into the experimental method. He wrote "Natural and Experimental History". He studied the effect of cold in preventing animal putrefaction.