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Message: <blockquote data-quote="haakon1" data-source="post: 5695603" data-attributes="member: 25619">Destitute (Underclass)I think most foreigners would actually be merchants, sailors, teamsters, or adventurers -- people with a reason to travel, and not necessarily that poor.Poorer refugees (some might not be so poor, but escaping non-economic troubles, like an invasion) would be in this class, at least until they "get back on their feet".But I think most of the Destitute would be homegrown.In the 19th century, Karl Marx described the lumpenproletariat, "underclass" or "marginalized" people in more modern terms, like this:"This scum of the depraved elements of all classes ... decayed roués (rakes), vagabonds, discharged soldiers, discharged jailbirds, escaped galley slaves, swindlers, mountebanks (con men), lazzaroni (day labourers/street thugs of Naples), pickpockets, tricksters, gamblers, brothel keepers, tinkers, beggars, the dangerous class, the social scum, that passively rotting mass thrown off by the lowest layers of the old society."A sociologist in New York City described (in less pejorative terms) the underclass in 1981 as consisting of 4 main groups:-- the passive poor, usually long term welfare recipients (beggars or workhouse dwellers in a pre-modern milleau) -- the hostile street criminal, drop-outs, low-class prostitutes, and drug addicts-- the hustlers, dependent on the underground economy, but rarely involved in violent crime--  the traumatized drunks, drifters, homeless bag ladies, and released mental patientsI'm thinking the medieval, 19th century, and current versions of the class probably aren't all that different.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underclass" target="_blank">Underclass - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia</a></blockquote>

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