Kent Lay Subsidy 1334/5

KENT ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY KENT LAY SUBSIDY OF 1334/5 Edited by H. A. HANLEY and C. W CHALKLIN The text of the article has recently been used by Terence Lawson and Christopher Chalklin in 'Medieval Taxation: the Lay Subsidy of 13345', An Historical Atlas of Kent, T.Lawson and D. Killingray, eds (Chichester, 2004), 25. For another comment on the source, see R. E. G,lasscock, 'The Distribution of Lay Wealth in Kent, Surrey and Sussex in the Early Fourteenth Century', Archaeologia Cantiana LXXX (1966), 618. J. L. Bolton, The Medieval English Economy, 11501500 (1980) and H. C. Darby, An New Historical Geography of England before 1600 (Cambridge, 1977) provide helpful general background. The publication C. C. Fenwick, ed., The Poll Taxes of 1377, 1379 and 1381, Part I BedfordshireLeicestershire (Oxford, 1988) makes easy our study of the size and distribution of Kentish population towards the end of the fourteenth century First published 196l Medieval Kentish Society, Kent Archaeological Society Republished 2008 © Kent Archaeological Society 2008 INTRODUCTION THE BACKGROUND The unique local interest of the county lay subsidy rolls in the Public Records Office has long been recognized by local record societies. Since the latter half of the nineteenth century they have been responsible for the publication of selected assessments for more than a dozen counties1 and these have proved a valuable aid to historical and genealogical research. Until now, however, none of the extant assessments for Kent has appeared in print, and the present edition of the fifteenth and tenth2 of 1334 is an attempt to remedy the deficiency. The roll (E179/123/12) consists of twenty-nine parchment membranes, most of which measure one foot by three feet fastened at the top in the form of a file. It contains 11,016 names and assessments arranged in double columns. The roll was chosen from among a number of assessments suitable for publication: thus the 1327 subsidy roll is of equal length and the roll of 1338 contains about 17,000 names. Yet the assessment of 1334 is of special interest as a turning point in the history of medieval taxation in the county and as the first in a series of assessments unique among English subsidy rolls after this date. The tax on moveables, originally copied from ecclesiastical practice, was at the time of its inception in the late twelfth century a radical departure from the old cumbersome methods of feudal taxation.3 Although it long retained something of the character of an emergency measure requiring the justification of a war or other crisis it was applied with increasing frequency in the course of the thirteenth century and a regular machinery of assessment and collection was gradually evolved. By the first years of the reign of Edward III the practice was to issue commissions from the exchequer appointing two experienced royal servants as chief taxors to supervise the assessment and collection of the tax in each county. These in turn, acting on specific instructions, were responsible for the appointment of sub-assessors, four or more of the “best men” in each city, borough and vill (or, as was more usual in Kent, in each hundred) to assess the property of their neighbours. The names of the taxpayers in each local district and the amounts were set down on rolls, copies of which were handed to the chief taxor. From them was compiled the formal county roll which was returned to the exchequer. In 1334 the whole character of the tax was altered. The collection of the previous subsidy of a fifteenth and tenth granted in 1332 had been accompanied by more than the usual measure of popular discontent and there were widespread charges of extortion against the chief taxors, many of whom were eventually brought to trial. When parliament was asked again to grant a subsidy in September 1334, there was a general demand that there should be no recurrence of such abuses. As a result certain changes in the mode of assessment and collection were decided upon. In each county the two chief taxors, of whom one was to be a Religious, were instructed to treat with the men of each local district and to agree upon a lump sum or fine for their share of the subsidy. If no agreement could be reached they were to make the assessment themselves; the amount levied in any district was not to fall below that raised by the 1332 assessment. Collection of the money was entrusted to the Religious alone. In Kent the chief taxors appointed by a writ dated 4th October 13344 were Thomas Bacoun and the Abbot of St. Augustine, Canterbury. Bacoun, a royal servant of long standing, was a judge of Kings Bench and in September 1334 was the justice of assize in Kent.5 In the following year he was appointed as one of the three investigators of suspected irregularities by the chief taxors and collectors of the 1332 subsidy in the counties of Kent, Surrey, Essex, Hertford and Middlesex.6 His colleague Thomas Poucyn, Abbot of St. Augustine, had been a simple monk before his election earlier in the same year and his appointment was presumably solely on account of his office. He also acted as collector for the Canterbury diocese of the clerical tenth granted in October 1344.7 The new arrangement which set the pattern for all future subsidies meant the “freezing“ of what had formally been a variable tax. In succeeding “fifteenths and tenths” the amounts agreed upon in 1334 continued to be charged against each locality. The allocation of the charge within the locality was a matter for the inhabitants themselves and was no concern of the chief taxors. As a result, the returns of the 1334 and of later subsidies for the country as a whole contain, with one exception, only the amounts contributed by each district. 1 For a full list see E.L.C.Mullins, Text and Calendars: an analytical Guide to Serial Publications published by the Royal Historical Society, 1958 2 i.e. A fifteenth of moveable property in the county and a tenth in cities, boroughs and vills 3 The following account is largely based on J.F.Willard Parliamentary Taxes Taxes on Personal Property, 1290-1334 (Medieval Academy of America, Cambridge, Mass., 1934) 4 C.P.R. 1334-38, pp.38-40 5 C.P.R. 1334-38, p.22 6 ibid., p.202 7 C.C.R. 1333-37, p.439 The exception is Kent. For this county both in 1334 and in later years the detailed lists of the individual taxpayers and their assessments continue as before. This special treatment was not the result of any overt royal instruction; the writs issued to the Kent taxors were in exactly the same terms as those sent to other counties. The only official hint that Kent is a special case is found in certain entries in the King’s Remembrancer’s Memoranda Roll. These show that while the other chief taxors were given abstracts from the 1332 rolls to guide them in their work those for Kent were entrusted with the complete 1332 county roll. 1 Yet if the official documents do not explain the exceptional form of the Kent return it is clear that it is closely linked with the presence in the county of two classes of persons enjoying exemption from the tax, the men of the liberty of the Cinque Ports and the moneyers of Canterbury.2 Of these, the moneyers, a small but important group, had been exempted from the national subsidies by a grant of Edward I. The exemption of the Cinque Ports men first conferred in 1260 was established in detail by a royal inspeximus in 1327. This declared that their goods both within and outside the liberty which contributed to the maintenance of the fleet were not to be taxed for tallages or any burdens whatsoever with goods of men not of the Cinque Ports. 3 Members of both groups owned personal estate scattered throughout many hundreds and in the 1334 roll the assessments on such property were evaluated and listed separately within the hundred affected. A similar procedure had been adopted in 1332. In this case it is not obvious why it was thought necessary to include exempt persons; a possible explanation is that there was some uncertainty about the continuing exemption of the Ports. In the case of the 1334 and later taxes, however, an explanation is easier to find. Assuming that the chief taxors acting in accordance with their instructions, negotiated a lump assessment for each hundred, this would normally be related to the amount raised in 1332. If, however, the amount for a hundred containing some Cinque Port property were estimated on the basis of the sum actually collected in 1332 without taking account of exempt property there was a danger that the result would be unfairly high. For if the property owned by the Cinque Port men had increased since 1332 it is obvious that the amount actually due from the hundred ought to be proportionally lower. Thus in 1334 and in all later subsidies the amount assessed on the Cinque Ports men is always deducted from the charge against the hundred as a whole. The complete omission of the boroughs of Dover, Sandwich, Hythe and New Romney, which were wholly within the liberty of the ports, accords well with this explanation as no problem would arise in these cases. It is, however, rather surprising that it was felt necessary to list the individual contributions in those hundreds in which there was no exempt property, but presumably this was because of the possibility that an exempt person might have acquired property there in the interval since the previous return.

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