The institutions of ecclesiastical justice described in the previous chapter were perhaps best suited to serve a society made up of small-scale, static communities unified by strong bonds of moral and religious sentiment. But English society had of course never been quite like that, and it was made less so by the multifarious economic and religious changes of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Yet if social and mental structures set firm boundaries on what the church courts could hope to achieve, there none the less remained ample areas in which they could perform a valuable function; and it is arguable that some of the changes of the period 1570–1640 actually worked in the church courts' favour or, at least, offered them new opportunities. This and the succeeding chapter explore the social background with particular reference to economic and social structures and to religious beliefs and observances, and, since the nature of the church courts' work gave them some chance of influencing the latter, offer some preliminary insights into how the courts performed in practice. The survey outlines the situation in England as a whole but focuses more especially on conditions in the county of Wiltshire and illustrates the variety of experience at the very local level by reference to the sample parishes of Wylye and Keevil.

The church courts worked in a complex social and economic environment. In mid-Elizabethan England commercial agriculture was already highly developed, there was a relatively sophisticated marketing system, and the metropolis and other, smaller urban centres exerted considerable influence on the economy.