Monday, February 2, 2015

There and Back Again


From Domesday, by Michael Wood:
In the mid-third century, after a series of economic crises, the currency of the Roman Empire became worthless and the government was forced to raise most of its revenues by requisitions in kind, and to pay the army mainly in kind, with foodstuffs and supplies. Then from the 270s onwards came what the late Romans called the renovatio, the renewal, under the Emperor Diocletian. It was Diocletian who reorganized things into an elaborate system of taxation in kind.
 
From The Wealth of Nations, by Adam Smith:
The revenues of the ancient Saxon kings of England are said to have been paid, not in money but in kind, that is, in victuals and provisions of all sorts. William the Conqueror introduced the custom of paying them in money...

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