Skilled artisans in the cloth, building, shipbuilding, printing, and cutlery trades organized friendly societies to peacefully insure themselves against unemployment, sickness, and intrusion of foreign labour into their trades, as was common among guilds. There was a rebellion in Northumberland and Durham in 1740, and an assault on Quaker corn dealers in 1756. Irregular rises in food prices provoked the Keelmen to riot in the port of Tyne in 1710 and tin miners to steal from granaries at Falmouth in 1727. Kevin Binfield asserts that organized action by stockingers had occurred at various times since 1675, and he suggests that the movements of the early 19th century should be viewed in the context of the hardships suffered by the working class during the Napoleonic Wars, rather than as an absolute aversion to machinery. The new inventions produced textiles faster and cheaper because they were operated by less-skilled, low-wage labourers, and the Luddite goal was to gain a better bargaining position with their employers. Working conditions were harsh in the English textile mills at the time but efficient enough to threaten the livelihoods of skilled artisans. The majority of individuals were primarily concerned with meeting their own daily needs. The lower classes of the 18th century were not openly disloyal to the king or government, generally speaking, and violent action was rare because punishments were harsh. When the "Luddites" emerged in the 1810s, his identity was appropriated to become the folkloric character of Captain Ludd, also known as King Ludd or General Ludd, the Luddites' alleged leader and founder.
In 1779, Ned Ludd, a weaver from Anstey, near Leicester, England, is supposed to have broken two stocking frames in a fit of rage. In the Welsh versions of Geoffrey's Historia, usually called Brut y Brenhinedd, he is called Lludd fab Beli, establishing the connection to the early mythological Lludd Llaw Eraint. 'Lud' or 'Ludd' ( Welsh: Lludd map Beli Mawr), according to Geoffrey of Monmouth's legendary History of the Kings of Britain and other medieval Welsh texts, was a Celtic King of 'The Islands of Britain' in pre- Roman times, who founded London and was buried at Ludgate. The name developed into the imaginary General Ludd or King Ludd, who was reputed to live in Sherwood Forest like Robin Hood. Ned Ludd, however, was completely fictional and used as a way to shock and provoke the government. The movement was said to be named after Ned Ludd, an apprentice who allegedly smashed two stocking frames in 1779 and whose name had become emblematic of machine destroyers. The name Luddite ( / ˈ l ʌ d aɪ t/) is of uncertain origin. Over time, the term has come to mean one opposed to industrialisation, automation, computerisation, or new technologies in general. Mill and factory owners took to shooting protesters and eventually the movement was suppressed with legal and military force, which included execution and penal transportation of accused and convicted Luddites.
The Luddite movement began in Nottingham in England and culminated in a region-wide rebellion that lasted from 1811 to 1816.
This left many people unemployed and angry. But when workshop owners set out to find a job at a factory, it was very hard to find one because producing things in factories required fewer workers than producing those same things in a workshop. Many Luddites were owners of workshops that had closed because factories could sell the same products for less. Luddites feared that the time spent learning the skills of their craft would go to waste, as machines would replace their role in the industry. They protested against manufacturers who used machines in what they called "a fraudulent and deceitful manner" to get around standard labour practices. The group are believed to have taken their name from Ned Ludd, a legendary weaver supposedly from Anstey, near Leicester. The Luddites were a secret oath-based organisation of English textile workers in the 19th century who formed a radical faction which destroyed textile machinery.
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