For my PhD, I am undertaking a comprehensive analysis of wage labour and poverty in Dorset from c.1680 to 1834. My research, which will be a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, will help bridge the gap in literature by directly linking these two topics. It will consider how individuals and households managed to survive at the subsistence level and what happened if they did not manage to ‘get by’. The research will focus on the Kingston Lacy estate, in east Dorset.