At the Parliament. . . Begynned Holden at Westminster the Second of April in XIII Yere of Elizabeth. 1578.
This is a portion of text from an act of Parliament in the reign of Elizabeth I defining who should be classified as "roges, vacaboundes, and sturdie beggers, to haue and receaue the punyshment aforesayde, for the sayde lewde manner of lyfe" (see the first full paragraph, near the bottom of the image). This act was a part of the fundamental restructuring of the so-called Elizabethan poor law which attempted to solve the problems of poverty and vagrancy in sixteenth-century England.

The text of the act is printed in black-letter type, the type which English children were taught to read from hornbooks. Black letter was believed to be easy to read and as such constituted what might be called a least-common-denominator type face. Used to print authoritative materials such as acts of Parliament, royal proclamations, and the Bible, black letter was designed to reach as wide an audience as possible across the entirety of the social spectrum. Black letter could be read by lord and labourer alike. It has also been suggested that as typographical styles changed over time, the crown especially clung to black letter because it lent the authority drawn from age and tradition to its publications.

Folger Call No. STC 9477a. A6v.