Social hierarchy
What Social hierarchy means in History B Schools History Project GCSE, as defined for OCR.
Definitions of Social hierarchy
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Reference: OCR
A system in which land ownership and tribute reinforced the power of the elites, whose hereditary status granted privileges forbidden to commoners.
Elizabethan society was strictly hierarchical, with stark contrasts in living standards between the rich, the middling sort and the poor.
Society was strictly hierarchical, divided into jarls (nobles), karls (free farmers and craftsmen), and thralls (enslaved people).
Society was strictly hierarchical, dominated by the king, nobility, and the immensely powerful Catholic Church.
Topics that use Social hierarchy
- British Depth Study: The Elizabethans, 1580–1603 (OCR GCSE)
- Period Study: Viking Expansion, c.750–c.1050 (OCR GCSE)
- Thematic Study: Crime and Punishment, c.1250 to present (OCR GCSE)
- World Depth Study: Aztecs and the Spanish Conquest, 1519–1535 (OCR GCSE)
Related terms
- Military strategy
- Religious conformity
- Administration and governance
- Anglo-Spanish conflict
- Archaeological evidence
- Authority and control
- Bloody Code
- Changing attitudes to punishment
Using Social hierarchy in the exam
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