middling sort

plural middling sorts

1. The middle class, especially in 18th-century Britain.

   The upper ranks thought the middling sort were greedy, obsessed with making money, virtuous enough, but lacking taste, elegance and culture.

   2015, Keith Linley, ‘Antony and Cleopatra’ in Context: The Politics of Passion, Anthem Press, →ISBN, page 33

   2 more examples

   On the contrary: ever since the decline of the music halls, theatre had been the purview of the middling sort—even when the subject matter was ostensibly proletarian.

   2005, Tony Judt, “The Social Democratic Movement”, in Postwar: A history of Europe since 1945, London: Vintage Books, published 2010, →ISBN

   The rise of a middling sort of people is regarded as one of the most significant historical developments in early modern Britain, and an extensive historiography has been devoted to defining this social group.

   2019, Tawny Paul, The Poverty of Disaster: Debt and Insecurity in Eighteenth-Century Britain, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 11

   Synonyms: middling class