Book Armor Because the Empire never Ended

Criminal Types

Ruffler
A returned soldier who refuses to beg, but bullies, robs and steals.

Upright-man
Previously a servant, who is "skilful in picking, rifling, and filching," and who will bully lesser vagabonds. They are too proud to travel with their women ("morts").

Hooker or Angler
Carries a pole with a hook on the end, to snatch items through windows when people are asleep.

Rogue
Less skilled than the hooker, and more timid, the rogue is a more conventional thief.

Prigger
A horse thief.

Abram-man
Pretends to be mad, and to have been in the hospital for the insane, Bedlam.

Counterfeit crank
Pretends to have the "falling sickness," epilepsy.

Dummerer
Pretends to be dumb, if not deaf. According to Harman, "the most part of these are Welshmen."

Then (lower in status than the men) there are the female beggars:

Bawdy-basket
Carries a basket with trinkets, and uses it to get on good terms with the maidservants in a gentleman's house, from which they then steal.

Autem-mort
Actually married , often to an upright-man; she will take her children with her.

Walking mort
Not married, and therefore vulnerable to other beggars, especially men: "Many of these had, and have children. When they get caught, either with begging, bitchery, or bribery, they are quickly shaken out of all by the upright-men."

Doxy
"These doxies be broken and spoiled of their maidenheads by the upright-men," and then become prostitutes.

Dell
"[A] young wench, able for generation, and not yet known or broken by the upright-man."

Kinchin mort and kinchin co
The kinchin mort is a girl, the kinchin co a boy. Even for these Harman has no pity, for he comments,"soon ripe, soon rotten."