Red brick & cobblestones on the street where the Pilgrims lived.

Adding to the Pilgrims' worries: Leiden's corrupt city government was beginning to fall apart. A barricade was built around city hall and protected by soldiers. There was mob rule in the streets and the mob had become not-so-tolerant of religions from other countries (at least one Pilgrim was beaten senseless on his way home from church). To top it off, the Pilgrims were farmers trying to adapt to city life. The main way to earn a living in Leiden was to work in the cloth mills. You could make a decent buck while you're young, but the old guys didn't work as fast and so brought home less money. They couldn't get ahead or get out of debt.

The Pilgrims started looking around for someplace else to set up shop.

Here are links to cover this week's posts:
https://atdspain.com/en/news/how-was-netherlands-part-spanish-empire
https://www.britannica.com/place/Spanish-Netherlands
https://americanliteraturechallenge.wordpress.com/2012/01/23/why-did-the-puritans-leave-holland-were-their-reasons-justified-2/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvinism
https://netherlandsinsiders.com/discover-the-pilgrims-legacy-in-leiden-their-home-from-1609-1620/
https://www.saburchill.com/history/events/009.html
https://leidenamericanpilgrimmuseum.org/en/page/pilgrim-life-in-leiden-why-the-pilgrims-left
https://www.lakenhal.nl/en/story/leiden-cloth

Back to the beginning of The Western Civ User's Guide to Reading & Writing.

Don't forget: I wrote another Western Civ User's Guide! Back to the beginning of The Western Civ User's Guide to Time & Space.