Those were the days

I’ve been sucked into family tree stuff again. Just by trying to confirm my mum’s year of birth...
Four hundred years ago there were only about 6 million on this little island. Nearly all my relatives seemed poor, they seemed to like having loads of kids (partly to offset the ones that died I guess) - and to live into your 60s was being proper old.
I find it all faintly depressing and I’m surprised they kept their shit together well enough to get to me arriving on earth.