The capture of the French king John II at Poitiers in 1356 marked the end of royal taxation as a temporary, wartime expedient and its beginning as an annual assessment. John Henneman's detailed treatment of war financing in the period immediately preceding, from 1322 to 1356, is the first volume in a proposed study of royal finances in France during the fourteenth century. Mr. Henneman has chosen a chronological approach to his subject in order to show how the evolving theory and practice of taxation were affected by these turbulent years of war and negotiation, political faction and dynastic feuds, social and economic change.
Mr. Henneman discusses the king's requirements for money over and above his normal revenues, the methods he used to raise the funds, the responses of his subjects, and the changes these procedures made in the development of French institutions. His study is based largely on unpublished sources, especially the manuscripts found in French provincial archives. As the royal financial records in Paris have been dispersed or destroyed, these manuscripts arc of particular importance.
Originally published in 1971.
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Royal Taxation In Fourteenth Century France
The Development of War Financing, 1322-1356
By John Bell HennemanPRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 1971 Princeton University Press
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-691-05188-8Contents
Preface, vii,
List of Abbreviations, xiii,
Genealogical Table, xvii,
Map, xviii,
I. The French Crown and Its Finances At The Beginning of the Fourteenth Century, 3,
1. Fiscal Terminology, 3,
2. The Geographic and Administrative Framework, 8,
3. Economic and Social Change, 12,
4. Royal Fiscal Power in Theory and Practice, 17,
5. Politics and Taxation under the Last Capetians, 27,
II. The War Subsidies for Gascony and Flanders, 1324-1329, 40,
1. The War of Saint-Sardos, 40,
2. The Later Taxes of Charles IV, 55,
3. Philip VI's First Year as King, 69,
III. The Fiscal Policies and Feudal Aids of Philip VI, 1329-1336, 80,
1. Fiscal Expedients and Court Politics, 80,
2. The Feudal Aids, 90,
3. Financial Preparations for War, 107,
IV. The Beginnings of the Hundred Years' War, 1337-1340, 116,
1. Early Resistance to Tax Requests, 116,
2. The Widely Varied Taxes of 1340, 141,
V. The Political and Fiscal Difficulties of Philip VI, 134-345, 154,
1. The Establishment of More Uniform Taxes, 154,
2. The Crisis of 1343, 167,
3. Declining Revenues in Time of Truce, 177,
VI. Military Disaster, the Estates, and the Plague, 1346-1348, 191,
1. The Estates of Languedoil, 191,
2. The Estates of Languedoc, 202,
3. Fiscal Confusion and the Siege of Calais, 216,
4. The Great Subsidy of 1347-1348 and the Black Death, 227,
VII. Towards More Uniform Taxation under John II, 1349-1353, 239,
1. Recovery from the Plague, 239,
2. The Spread of Regional Assemblies, 249,
VIII. The Valois-Evreux Rupture And The Fiscal Crisis of 1354-356, 264,
1. Taxation and Treaty Negotiations, 1354, 264,
2. Languedoc and the Prince of Wales, 272,
3. Languedoil and the Estates General, 282,
IX. A Half-Century of Royal Taxes: Major Conclusions, 303,
1. The Age of the War Subsidy, 303,
2. The Low Level of Taxation: Privilege and Politics, 308,
3. Necessity and Localism: Theory and Practice, 320,
Appendices,
I. Coinage Problems and Their Effect on Fiscal Documents, 331,
II. Tabulation of Major Taxes and Extraordinary Royal Revenues, 1322-1356, 354,
Bibliography, 361,
Index, 377,
CHAPTER 1
The French Crown and Its Finances at the Beginning of the Fourteenth Century
To understand the financial position of the French monarchy in the first quarter of the fourteenth century, one first must be acquainted with the fiscal terminology and administrative geography employed in the documents. Of even greater importance are the economic, social, and political factors which conditioned the development of royal taxing powers at the beginning of this period.
1. Fiscal Terminology
The term "taxation" is used here to describe a set of late medieval practices which produced revenues but which often seem rather remote from "taxation" in the modern sense. The fourteenth century had no single word to describe these practices, but several which overlapped in meaning, each referring to the collection of money by a government. When a ruler canceled a tax or granted exemption, he usually used several words, such as "aids," "subsidies," "impositions," and gabelles, in order to be properly inclusive. All these words, however, seem to have had a
